Unforgettable Heroes II Boxed Set

by Elizabeth Bevarly

  Nick rubbed his neck. “Nobody knows who committed the murders, but Quent told Emily before he went on the lam….”

  “Whoa, boy!” Blue set down his cup. “You left out the going on the lam part. Are you telling me Quent did shoot Cal?”

  Nick leaned forward. “Uh, we highly suspect so.”

  Blue glanced at Chris. “That means Quent confessed to Emily, but we’re not supposed to know about it.”

  Nick stared at him as he leaned back in the booth. “Do you read Braille too?”

  “Son, after listening to folks for years, I can read between the lines. You had to tell us the whole story ’cause I’m assuming this is going somewhere. Needless to say neither Chris nor I have any reason to go blab it to another soul.”

  Nick nodded. “Yep. I know that. That’s why I’m telling you Quent divulged to her the name of the second man in charge of the drug ring. He told her he didn’t think the guy, known as the lieutenant, knew about the sex ring. But the lieutenant does know who the kingpin is.”

  Blue grinned. “Let me guess. The lieutenant is Yancey Caldwell.”

  Nick collapsed on the table, hiding his head before rising back to a seated position. “How do you do that?”

  Blue shook his head. “I don’t. Chris figured that part out.”

  Chris smiled. “Actually, my friend Wesley did. You asked Blue to get me to check out Lyle Burton. We traced down his missing years to Florida and Cuba, where Lyle first went on the skids and got saved by working a penny ante drug trade in the resort communities. He caught the interest of some of the big players. One of the guys evidently took him under his wing, and Lyle operated a trade between Florida and Cuba smuggling refugees into the country, but taking them into their labor ring. It soon expanded into sex trade.”

  “So the head man had him shift it up here with Hispanic field workers?”

  He shook his head. “Not exactly. Lyle worked in many places in the US, funneling illegal Mexicans into the system, and also doing some drug smuggling as well. He found he could harvest the bodies when the drugs were close by.”

  Nick smirked. “Harvest bodies. What a turn of phrase.”

  Chris held up his arms. “What can I say? That’s what they call it. Anyway, when his parents croaked, he made a deal to work under cover up here, appear presentable but use this as home base. He brought one of the guys he’d worked with along for the ride, a man named Maynard Davis, and put him on the payroll. Maynard worked in his shipping business for a long time, but he lacks finesse, made a lot of people angry. So, Lyle had him pose as the gardener and do smuggling jobs for him at will.”

  Nick nodded. “Ah, yes. The gardener. I should have known. Guess Cal never got to question Justine. But I don’t know how Yancey fits into all this.”

  Blue leaned his elbow on the table. “Lyle needed someone to foil Taylor’s project, someone who really hated Taylor’s guts. Yancey was a prime target. He must have dug up some pretty foul stuff on the man, because he obviously went for it. But if what Quent told Emily’s true, even Yancey doesn’t know the depth of the shit he stepped in.” He took another long slug of coffee. “I take it neither you nor Emily reported anything about Yancey?”

  Nick shook his head. “I wasn’t sure how to nail the guy anyway. But I thought you might.”

  Blue smiled. “I take it you think I have a devious mind.”

  “I do.” Nick grinned. “Anybody who can tar a guy’s balls can be pretty sneaky.”

  Blue chuckled. “Let me work on it. But you tell Emily and her whole family to be on the outlook for incoming trouble. I don’t think Yancey and Lyle are committing the murders with their own hands, but Lyle’s recruit is out there, and I doubt he cares if his hands get bloody one more time.”

  Nick took a deep breath. “I think you’re right. In fact, I think he enjoys it.”

  ****

  “We need to lie low for a while,” Lyle told Monstruo. “The cops have already asked about your car being up here and I don’t want any more focus on me. I suggest you take a break and pursue other things, like finding fresh meat. Quietly.”

  Monstruo grinned. “Don’t guess you like the way I kill folks.”

  Lyle folded his robe over him and crossed his legs. “Be quiet. Justine’s in bed and she doesn’t know you’re here. That only brings trouble for me, and you don’t want to bring down grief here. The old saying, ‘when Mama’s not happy nobody’s happy’ goes in spades.” He stared at his employee and felt a pang of concern, like a person feels for a pet. The man had done everything he asked for years. The fact he now saw him spiraling out of control bothered him, but what Monstruo did for him made up for the guy’s advancing insanity.

  He sighed. “Look, I don’t mind as long as they don’t find them dead. But I much prefer you just add to our trade. It makes the big guys happy. And it makes both of us richer.”

  Monstruo laughed. The laugh was an irritant, reminding Lyle just how crazy the guy’d become. The sound grated on his nerves.

  “The last three have stayed here. How about them, boss?”

  Monstruo’s eyes mocked him, filling him with anger. How dare the man question his choices? “Every business owner is allowed to skim some cream.” He chuckled, trying to make light of Monstruo’s remarks. “And I have some smooth lickings. Keep me happy, man, and I’ll keep your pockets full.”

  Monstruo nodded and turned to leave. Then he glanced back. “What about Girlie Franklin? She seems to keep the limelight on us. But I saw her pussy, and I want her.”

  He nodded. “For that very reason, she has to be off-limits. Do anything to her, kidnap her, and the entire town will be down on our heads.”

  Monstruo bent down on his knees, crawling across the floor and opened Lyle’s robe. He looked up. “But I want to fuck her.”

  Lyle’s eyes closed, shaded, as he felt the man’s hands. “All right. If you must. But, whatever you do, make sure wherever you take her, no one will ever find her again.”

  ****

  Emily got home at the regular time, and Nick was waiting on her, sitting calmly on the sofa with two glasses and a bucket of champagne on the coffee table. “Okay,” she said. “It’s nobody’s birthday. We’ve only been seeing each other a month and a half, and nobody else is here. Do you want to give me a clue what’s going on?”

  He winked and patted the sofa next to him. “Come sit down.” Laughing, Nick poured her a glass of champagne. After he’d filled it, he picked up his glass and faced her. He raised the glass.

  “Here’s to the best woman a man could ever find, someone who puts up with my shit but still gives anything a try, who has a heart so big I think it could swallow up all the homeless and any nearby stray animals, and who loves me with her body and her heart in an intensity any man would cherish.”

  Tears filled her eyes. She choked as she went to take a sip of her champagne. “Damn it. I wanted to toast you back, but I’m so overwhelmed, I don’t think I can say the words.”

  He tenderly removed the glass from her fingers, putting hers and his on the table and grabbed both her hands. “Try.”

  She took a deep breath, while still crying. “Here’s to a man I never thought I’d find, who tried to act tough but has a soft gooey center, who loves orphaned children and anyone who doesn’t fit, and who taught me how to love with everything I have, in a passion I never knew I could feel and an ache of joy from loving him that can never be erased.”

  He kissed her, tangling his hands in her hair and pulled her to him. His tongue entered her mouth but only savored her, didn’t explore. This was a kiss of tenderness, a joining of souls that had been declared this day. As they finished the kiss, he grinned, kissing her eyelids and the back of her neck. “Do you have any idea how much you mean to me?”

  She giggled. “I think I’m finding out.”

  He fished in his pocket and scooted off the sofa. Opening the ring box, he looked up in her eyes. “Emily Franklin, will you marry me?”

  Her eyes wi
dened in surprise and her mouth made a small O. Nothing came out of her mouth.

  “Emily?” he stared at her. “I’m dying here. Are you going to answer me?”

  She took her eyes off the ring for a second and smiled at him. “Yes, of course, yes.” Her voice dropped, a soft tenderness evident in her words. Relief washed over him. Just as he was about to hug her, he saw her eyes were back on the ring. Her jaw dropped. “But I-a-I-a-I-a…never saw a ring that big before.”

  He smiled. “I can afford it.”

  She sucked in her breath. “Nick, you have to take it back. It costs too much.” Tears welled in her eyes. “I love it. But I don’t want to bankrupt us before we even begin.”

  He started to laugh and then laughed more as he grabbed her hands. “It’s okay, Emily. I told you. I can afford it.”

  She exhaled sharply. “Nick, even Taylor wouldn’t buy this.”

  He laughed again, hesitating as he searched for the right words. He’d never had to explain this and uncertainty tickled at the back of his mind. “I have more money than Taylor.”

  Her mouth gaped open. “You, what?”

  He smiled. “I’m rich.”

  “You…really…have that…much…money?” She blinked.

  He sat back up on the sofa. “Hope you don’t mind if I got out of that position, but yes.”

  She laughed and then laughed some more, slapping her hands on her knees. “I love it.”

  He stared into her eyes, grabbing her hands again. “But do you love me?”

  She smiled. “Oh yes, Nick. I love you and I already said yes. Yes, I’ll marry you. I just can’t believe any of this.”

  “Then stick out your hand,” he said.

  She did as he asked, and he slipped the ring on her finger.

  She held it up to the light. “It’s big. But oh, it’s the most perfect thing I’ve ever seen. Except for you.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  “Lord have mercy, get a gander at this ring, Maggie.”

  Cindy held Emily’s hand in a firm hold, and for a minute, Emily wasn’t sure she was going to get it back. All the women milled around her like she was the latest supply of farm fresh tomatoes, while Aunt Millie stood behind her as if she’d been the farmer.

  “I was more than a little shocked.” Emily’s face burned. “So much has been happening for the bad, I never suspected something so wonderful would happen right in the middle of it.”

  “That’s the way it normally works,” Carolina said, as she stood next to her. “But you have to be quick and catch the moment. Sometimes another bad one is waiting around the bend.”

  “Now don’t go tellin’ Emily that,” Aunt Millie said. “Our family’s had enough bad stuff happen in the past few weeks to last a lifetime.”

  Carolina cleared her throat. “Okay, sorry. I guess I was mirroring my own experience on getting engaged onto Emily. Heaven knows I don’t want Nick to get shot like Andy did right after he proposed. And we sure as hell don’t want Emily to get kidnapped by a psycho.” She reached over and hugged Emily to her. “I’m so excited and happy for you, and I just want it to last for you. Something I do know from experience is that all the happiness doesn’t stop at I do.”

  “Or oh boy, we did,” Aunt Millie said, with a cackle.

  Cindy put a hand on one hip. “Millie, it’s time to update your joke collection. I swear, woman, every funny you tell has something to do with sex.”

  “Now you know where my mind is,” Millie said. “Proof in the pudding that at least in one way I’ve fully recuperated from that stabbing.”

  “Oh, jeez,” Emily said, “That reminds me. I did forget to tell y’all the latest from the sheriff’s department. They ran the fingerprints on Quent and the body that was found next to him. Get this. Quent’s real name was Sam Lincoln and his brother’s was Mark Lincoln.

  “Like the preacher?” Cindy asked.

  Emily nodded. “Brothers.”

  “That’s wild,” Carolina said. “What’s the story on them? Were they in on some scheme? Tied into the stuff that’s been happening?”

  Emily sighed. “I guess we’ll never know for sure. But it sure seems that way. Quent intimated he’d done some bad things.” She looked back at her aunt. “Considering he was Johnny-on-the-spot when you got hurt, I suspect he’s the one who did the deed. All I know is what he told me. That whatever he’d done he hadn’t meant to hurt anyone long term.”

  Aunt Millie crossed her arms. “My mama told me to never talk bad about someone who’s dead. So I won’t. But I will say that my house will never be the same. Some of my prize possessions took a lickin’. But I’m still here, and I guess I should praise the dear Lord for that.”

  “I know I do.” Emily leaned over and kissed her. “But you know what I wonder?” she asked the group. “Whatever happened to Mark Lincoln’s head?”

  ****

  “We have to talk.”

  Yancey looked up from his computer into the cold dark eyes of Lyle Burton. “The lion coming to the lamb? This must be an emergency. Have a seat and cool your heels.”

  Lyle’s eyes narrowed on the dense little shit. “The lamb doesn’t know how close he is to being roasted for Sunday dinner. If we don’t get our heads together, and fast, both of us will be hiding shanks in toilets and clanging on bars with tin cups.”

  Yancey chuckled. “I think you have an overexaggerated view of the situation. No one can pin a damn thing on you. I’m the one who has already been called on the carpet through Blue Moon’s irritating meddling. And, even then, it was business-as-usual, small-town politics. People around here don’t know how to handle anything out of the realm of who-knows-who and how to push the right Climax hot buttons. What we’re doing doesn’t compute to these country buffoons.”

  Lyle looked down his nose at the man. If he hadn’t been desperate to begin with, he’d have never approached Caldwell. The jerk was too cocky, too sure, too naïve. Lyle scoffed at Yancey. When a man has never known the gutter, he can’t conceive of drinking the sewage.

  “You never were very good at hearing the undercurrent. If you could, you’d realize a big sink hole is getting ready to swallow you alive.”

  Yancey shrugged. “So, Sam is dead? We just replace him. Others can be bought. What I would like to know is if you had a hand in his murder.”

  Lyle’s hands trembled, wanting to throttle the shit beyond an inch of his life. Everyone who worked for the kingpin suddenly wished to question his authority and motives. “Sam is dead because I spotted his tell. The man was about to sing like a canary.”

  “And so was a simple drug smuggler?”

  Lyle’s face burned. Impudence was fast sending this man to hell. “I had my reasons. You don’t need to know any more. Listen to me, and listen good. You best be covering all your bases now in case Sam already told the world your ID. And then, practice a story to get your sorry ass out of trouble. If you value your own life, you better make sure my name doesn’t show up in shit.”

  He stood and walked to the door, staring back over his shoulder. “I can strike when you least expect it, and you’ll never even feel the bite until after you’re dead.”

  ****

  Despite everyone trying to get her to stay, Emily left Cindy’s house before her aunt. The women had turned into overprotective mother hens. After all, she was just going home the same way she’d done a million times. The party was still going on, but all the gawking and wishing her well had done her in. She smiled. That and the sex she’d had with Nick the night before. Who’d think you could keep doing it for four hours?

  Looking at the sky, as it opened up and gushed, she decided the barometric pressure had added to her feeling of exhaustion, probably setting her off. Oh well, nothing like dodging puddles the size of small lakes on the way home. The distance was farther than from Blue’s, about five miles, but still not a huge way.

  If only that incessant bumping noise would stop.

  For the life of her, she couldn’t figure o
ut what was causing it. Looking in her rear view mirror, all she could see in the back seat was an umbrella and a bag of canning jars Cindy had given her for Aunt Millie to use. Still the thump was there, especially when she turned and jerked.

  Emily slowed close to zero as she hydroplaned in a deep crater of water and, swerving, carefully navigated it. If it kept raining like this, driving through puddles not only would be dangerous, it could be life-threatening. With creeks and streams around here everywhere, it wasn’t like the area didn’t flood. Even her own creek behind the house had been dangerously close to the back of the foundation on more than one occasion.

  As she drove closer to the house, she noticed the car behind her had not only stayed there, but It was now turning with her, down a road few would turn down. In fact, no one would but come down this one except her and the one or two others who might be coming to her house to visit or on delivery. “Ridiculous,” she said to herself. The dreary conditions just have you spooked. That and impending nightfall.

  Suddenly the car passed, almost sideswiping her car. Damn bad drivers. I swear they ought to stop people doing careless stuff around here. She took a deep breath as the bumping continued. With resignation, and irritation that couldn’t be ignored any longer, Emily finally stopped on the side of the quiet road. At least she would check the trunk. Fishing in the back of the car, she brought out the umbrella and, opening the car door, pushed the button on the shoot and let it pop out. She unlatched the truck lid from inside the car and got out, skirted the driver’s side, attempting to stay out of deep pools of liquid mud.

  “What in the hell did I leave in the trunk?” she muttered to herself, lifting the lid. “A bowling ball?” She raised the lid the whole way and stared, her breath catching in her throat, and her hand clutching it, as she saw the blood soaked interior and stared down into the bloody eyes of a man. A decapitated head.

  Screaming, she dropped the umbrella, convulsions hitting her body with bone-chilling terror. She stood stock-still, her blood coursing through her, burning her face and neck. Her heart pumped beyond its known limits as she struggled to gulp air into her empty lungs. Paralyzed, water pouring down on her, drenching her hair, her face, all she wanted to do was run. Away from it. Away from the horror. Away from the revolting reality of her plight.