by Lori Whitwam
“They planned to leave town an hour or two ago, so probably headed south on Highway 169. Our road manager, sound engineer, and rhythm guitarist are onboard.”
“I need their names and a cell phone number.”
Seth provided the information, and wondered what was so urgent. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good.
Chief LeFevre keyed his radio. “Paulsen, get down here. Pronto.” He tore the page out of the notebook as Sammy came running.
He skidded to a stop at the bottom of the path, his face flushed and his narrow chest heaving. “What do you need, Chief?”
“The ATF is gonna need the bus, and everybody in it. If that’s where the bomb was supposed to be, they need to make sure there’s not a second one, and question everybody who’s been around the bus in the time the bomb—or bombs—could have been placed there.” He indicated the page from his notebook. “Give them this information, tell them it’s where the device was intended to be. They’ll try to call the bus, tell ’em to pull off the road. You don’t have to call the Troopers. ATF will do that. Now get moving, before we have more trouble.”
Sammy ran.
“Holy shit,” Abby said. She looked stunned by the chief’s reaction to what Seth told him. “Bob, what’s going on?”
Chief LeFevre’s steady gaze took in both of them. “Did anybody but the two of you have access to the duffel bag at any time after it was taken off the bus?”
“No,” Seth said.
“Then the bomb was in the bag when you left, which makes the bus a crime scene.” He flipped the notebook to a fresh page and started writing. “Since it’s not likely somebody was lurking in Abby’s yard waiting for the right time to blow the thing, it was probably on a timer. Where would you have been at that time, if you’d been on the bus?”
“It’s damned near certain I’d have been asleep in my bunk, with the duffel bag right underneath me.” He suppressed a shudder as a vision of his blast-dismembered body flashed through his mind.
Abby’s gasp caught in her throat, and Seth silently cursed himself for blurting it out in front of her.
“But you were here instead,” Abby said, clutching his arm. “Thank goodness.”
“Mr. Caldwell…” said Chief LeFevre.
“Seth.”
“All right, Seth. I’m sure the ATF agents are going to need to talk to everybody who could have been on the bus recently. Everybody.” Seth opened his mouth to protest, but was silenced with a stern look. “Sure, it’s possible somebody watched and waited for an opportunity, but the fact is the person responsible is almost certainly somebody who knows your schedule extremely well and has access to the bus and your belongings.”
“No way. Those guys are my family. It has to be somebody else.” Seth stood and began pacing along the rocky shore, Dilbert prancing around him. His thoughts churned as he sought any explanation that didn’t involve his closest friends.
“Well, could be, could be. But it’s still somebody who was on the bus yesterday. They wouldn’t want to plant it too soon and take a risk you’d find it. If they wanted it to blow this morning, I’d guess it was set up last night.”
“During the show,” Abby said. “Seth, it had to be then.”
He considered. “Maybe. People were in and out of the bus all day, but once the show started, it’d be pretty unusual for anybody to be out there. We were all working, and some of us aren’t real good about locking up when we go inside.”
Chief LeFevre asked for the names and contact information for the band and crew who weren’t on the bus this morning. He noted the equipment van would also have to be stopped and searched. After he gave the information, Seth sat beside Abby to think. “It can’t be any of them. Can’t be.”
“Nobody’s going to jump to conclusions, son. Stranger things have happened. But don’t be so sure about it that you put yourself—or Abby—in danger, you hear?” He stuck the notebook in his pocket and turned to go. “We’ll talk some more after the team gets here and checks things out.”
“Okay, Bob. Thanks. I think,” Abby said. When the chief had gone, she turned to Seth. “Well, that was disturbing.”
“Little bit.” Honestly, he felt like he’d been punched in the diaphragm.
“I wish we could just disappear.”
“We can’t?”
“Not yet.” Abby stood, and a tiny smile softened the corners of her mouth. Seth’s heart lightened at the sight. “But I’ll show you where I go when I want to relax.”
She led him around a fallen, weathered log and a few steps into the trees, and pointed. He saw a rope hammock, sheltered but not concealed. He was surprised he hadn’t noticed it earlier, but he’d had a lot on his mind.
It took some maneuvering and coordination, but they tumbled into the hammock and lay together, swaying gently, facing the lake. With Abby in his arms and no one else in sight, he did feel calmer.
He traced the outline of her lips with one finger. “Trying to peel you out of those jeans in a hammock is probably a bad idea, huh?”
“I think it sounds brilliant, despite the risk of landing on my head in the dirt. But I don’t imagine we’ll be alone very long.”
“Maybe if we started right away?”
Abby laughed. While it wasn’t exactly the reaction he’d been hoping for, it still pleased him. “Nope. When you get me out of my jeans, I most definitely don’t want any interruptions. Possibly till August.”
He liked the sound of that.
Abby was on her back, semi-reclining in the lazy curve of the hammock, and Seth pulled himself up on one elbow beside her. With his hand on her opposite hip, he gazed down at her. A whisper of breeze fluttered a few layered strands of hair around her face, and the sunlight filtered through the leaves overhead, giving her skin a subtle glow. She wore almost no makeup, and her eyes, framed by thick, dark lashes met his without reservation.
He hoped to have many such opportunities to study the angle of her cheekbones, and the faint pink blush across her nose from standing too long in the morning sun. But this moment was priceless. He experienced a tightening in his chest and groin, evidence of how much he wanted her, in so many ways. He was most amazed, however, at the expansive sensation deep within him. It was as if previously unexplored regions were opening for the single purpose of accommodating the feelings awakened by the woman lying beside him.
Abby reached up and tucked his hair behind one ear, allowing her fingers to linger at the edge of his jaw. “See? It’s peaceful here. It won’t last, but I needed a few minutes away from the disaster area.”
“It’s perfect. And I totally could’ve had your jeans off by now.”
“I don’t doubt it for a second. But listen.”
Seth heard the sound of feet disturbing the rocks along the shoreline. A moment later, Abby’s mother appeared around the screen of trees.
“Sorry to interrupt,” she said. “But the ATF agents are here, and as soon as they make sure it’s safe, they want to talk to both of you.”
Seth reluctantly rolled from the hammock and offered his hand to help Abby regain her feet. With her mother already on the way back up the path, he placed his lips near Abby’s ear and whispered, “Next time, you’re wearing sweat pants.”
“Only if you do too,” Abby said. And then she pinched his ass.
Chapter Seven
Abby
They crested the slope from the lake, and the first thing Abby saw was a Chevy Suburban bearing the emblem of the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. This was not a sight she’d ever expected to encounter in her own driveway. Three men wearing protective vests led a yellow Labrador retriever around the yard near the damaged wall. Her home was officially a crime scene.
One of the agents, a weathered-looking man in his forties, noted their arrival and approached them. “Miss Delaney?”
Abby nodded to indicate she was. “This is Seth Caldwell.”
The man shook their hands. “I’m Special Agent Roger K
incaid. Before we discuss what happened, I’m going to have our explosives canine, Roxie, check the house and yard. Once we’re sure there aren’t going to be any surprises, we can go inside and talk. Sound okay?”
What was she supposed to say? “Sure.” Special Agent Kincaid returned to his team, while Abby, Seth, and her mother waited in the shade of the trees along the driveway. Dilbert bounded from the woods. He froze when he saw Roxie working back and forth through the debris-littered yard. His tail waved wildly, and he leaned forward in preparation to greet his guest. Seth reached down and snagged the dog’s collar, foiling his plans.
“Dilbert, now’s not the time to visit,” Abby said. “Seth, could you put him in the garage till they’re done?”
He opened the side door of the garage and coaxed the reluctant dog inside. “Sorry, buddy. I know she’s cute, but she’s working.”
Frank, Chief LeFevre, and his two officers stood by Frank’s SUV, looking somewhat perturbed to be left out of this stage of the investigation. “I’m surprised Sammy and Karl are still here. Where are the firemen, though?” Abby wondered aloud.
“A call came in about a grass fire out by the Ford dealership,” her mother answered. “But unless we have a crime wave, Sammy and Karl won’t leave till the food arrives.”
“Food?” More people were going to invade her home?
“Yes. I called my craft-club ladies, and Grace will make sure we have enough sandwiches to keep everybody from starvation. Goodness knows we can’t count on what’s in your refrigerator.”
“Feeding a battalion isn’t something I have to do on a regular basis.”
Marilyn patted her on the arm. “I know, sweetie. It was an observation, not criticism.” Abby thought the two were too closely related to merit distinction. “And Grace’s husband, Butch, will be by later with plywood and things to do some temporary repairs, until you can get Clancy out here. You missed the gas company. They came while you were down by the lake and shut off the gas to the house. You won’t be able to use your fireplace for a day or two, until they come back to do a full inspection.”
Abby blew out an exasperated breath. “I don’t imagine I need the furnace or the fireplace right now, so it’s fine.” Good thing she had an electric water heater. She was annoyed at having so little control over what was happening with her own house, but grateful her mom was handling the details.
The ATF team disappeared inside the house with Roxie and emerged several minutes later. Dilbert could be heard scratching at the inside of the garage door.
Special Agent Kincaid said, “Which vehicle were you driving last night, Miss Delaney?”
Abby indicated her Jeep.
“We’ll need to go over it too, just to be thorough. Would you open it for us, please?”
Abby complied, and Roxie circled the vehicle several times, sniffing in each open door and under the wheel wells, and climbing through the interior. When she reached the rear hatch, she sat and looked expectantly at her handler. The special agent, who resembled a Hell’s Angel more than a federal officer, praised her and rewarded her with a treat from his pocket.
“Roxie’s given us the all clear, so we can go inside and talk about what we know so far, and how we’re going to proceed,” Kincaid said.
The group assembled in Abby’s living room. She, Seth, and her mother sat on the couch, but Special Agent Kincaid remained standing. His men, whom he called explosives enforcement officers, went to the bedroom carrying bags and various containers for the collection of evidence. Chief LeFevre hovered nearby, but Frank, Sammy, and Karl waited out on the deck. Roxie had been placed in her kennel in the Suburban, a fact Dilbert deeply resented. He sulked under the coffee table.
In response to Kincaid’s questions, Seth repeated what he had told the police chief regarding his change of plans, and the typical comings and goings of the bus’s occupants. When he got to the part about the probability he would have been in his bunk if he hadn’t stayed with Abby, she clutched his hand.
“We were able to reach your friends on the bus, Mr. Caldwell, and they pulled off the road this side of Mille Lacs. Troopers are on the scene, and there’s a team checking out the bus.”
“What about the van?” Seth asked.
“They left later than they planned, so they’re only about ten miles farther down the road than the bus. I imagine you’ll be talking to them shortly.”
Abby was having a hard time sitting still. There were federal agents in her house, someone had tried to hurt—she couldn’t even think the word “kill”—Seth, her mother itched to interrogate the man she’d had sex with that morning, and a herd of sandwich-bearing craft ladies were due to descend on the whole circus at any moment. Where was the positive part of all this? “But everybody’s safe.”
“Yes, they’re safe, other people on the highway are safe, and we’ll be able to identify and question everybody.” He turned his attention once again to Seth. “If you could, tell me everywhere your bag was from the time you left the bus last night.”
“Well, it was in the back of Abby’s Jeep. We brought it in, and it sat at the breakfast bar for a while. I took it in the bathroom, and it was on the floor in there till this morning, when I took it in the other bedroom.”
“Anyplace else?”
Seth paused and shook his head. “No, sir. That’s it.”
“It fits all the hits by Roxie. The Jeep, the breakfast bar, and the bathroom. The other room, of course, was a given.” He gave a wry smile. “Okay, then, Mr. Caldwell, let’s take a look at what’s left of your belongings and see if we can come up with some useful information.”
Seth rose and went with Kincaid, and Abby felt brittle and vulnerable with him out of her sight. The magnitude of the situation started sinking in. Frank and the other men congregated in the kitchen, raiding her meager store of pop and snacks while they waited for lunch to arrive.
“Come on, sweetie,” her mother said. “Let’s go outside and get a little distance from all this testosterone.”
Seated in the deck chairs, her mother silenced her phone. “Abby, isn’t your phone ringing like crazy?”
“Nope. I turned it off. There’s nobody I need to talk to right now.” The thought of dealing with twenty calls from people asking what happened and gushing sentiments about how happy they were she was okay was more than she could handle. And the fact they’d also be fishing for details about her houseguest had not escaped her. “I think I’m still numb.”
“Of course you are. Nobody expects something like this.” Marilyn scooted her chair closer to her daughter’s.
“The last twenty-four hours have been all over the place.” Abby’s voice caught, and she realized she was going to cry. It kind of snuck up on her, but there was nothing she could do about it now.
“I heard your introduction to Seth didn’t go well.”
“It was awful. He was so furious and was being such a jackass, but we started talking…” Abby tried to swallow a sob, failed, and gave up, allowing the tears to flow. Her mother stroked her hair, patted her back, and eventually handed her a tissue from her well-stocked purse.
As soon as she was able, Abby poured out the whole story, from Cujo’s accident, to the talk in the park, the concert, and arriving here last night. She even told her about the conversation down by the lake this morning. She glossed over the juicy bits, but her mother was no fool. She knew exactly what had transpired, and had undoubtedly noted the rumpled condition of Abby’s bed.
When she was finished and had mopped the tears and snot from her face, she discovered a new emotion was taking hold. It was anger, and it was directed at her mother. It was unexpected and unwarranted, but she had opened the emotional floodgates, and there was no holding it back.
“And what the hell did you mean earlier when you said ‘calls I made myself’? Calling half the town—and I don’t even want to know who else—about Seth? What am I, fifteen years old?”
“I don’t know why you’re upset. I’d think yo
u’d be happy I don’t have any objections to your relationship with Seth.” Marilyn leaned back and looked as if she might be building up a head of steam of her own.
Abby leaped to her feet and began pacing. “Relationship? You don’t have any idea what you’re doing. Do you know what it means if I’m with Seth? Do you? I leave. I leave you, my friends, this house, Emporia, everything. Seth can’t stay here. He makes his living on the road. I’d have to…” Her throat closed up again. She clenched her fists and silently cursed herself for not being strong enough to get it all out.
“Do you love him?”
Abby’s head snapped up. “How can I love him? I just met him. That would be insane.”
“It doesn’t mean it’s not possible.”
“I know, but…”
Her mother set her shoulders and looked at her with hazel eyes hard as granite. “Abigail Kathleen Delaney, you listen to me.”
Abby knew the tone. Out of years of conditioning, she gathered the tattered remains of her composure and listened.
“Sit yourself back down there, and don’t you budge till I’m finished.”
Abby sat.
“You ought to know I’m not a dim-witted old woman who likes her daughter’s boyfriend because he’s handsome and polite. When I received the first call last night, I had a feeling, and, yes, I’ve been talking to people. I woke Dash and Nancy out of a sound sleep before dawn—and he didn’t appreciate it, let me tell you—so I could ask about Seth. Nobody had a bad thing to say about him, including people who usually find something bad to say about everybody.”
“The Emporia grapevine at work, huh?” Abby almost choked on the bitterness in her tone.
“Emporia and elsewhere. Believe me, you truly don’t want to know,” Marilyn said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “From everything I learned, he works hard, couldn’t tell a lie to save his life, and would do absolutely anything for people close to him. He doesn’t lose his temper often, but if somebody wrongs him, he never forgets. I can’t really fault him. Your father was the same way.” She shook her head and gave a brief, wistful smile.
