“Thanks, it's been an unusual day. Is my brother okay?” Had he shared anything with the sheriff about his past or why he left?
“Your brother is fine. He reminds me a lot of you. Not so much in attitude but in looks,” April replied. She answered a brief call then asked Officer Flatman to escort Gabriel to her office in ten minutes once he was done meeting with the detective and Sam. “Kellan, from what I can tell, your brother was shocked to hear about George's death. He'd already known from the newspaper what had happened, but he claims he barely knew the guy.”
“I wish I could help. I know nothing. I want to find out where he's been, what brought him back, and whether he's okay.”
“You're a good brother. He's lucky to have someone like you in his corner right now. I'll tell you what I know,” she said. For the first time, I noticed the vivacious lime green color of her eyes. “When we went through George's room, we found an employment contract he signed with your brother. I didn't know about it when we last spoke. I would've told you if I did, but this all happened overnight.”
“Gabriel was George's assistant? I had no idea he knew anything about science or botany. Or even construction. He was an unusually sensitive and nervous kid the whole time we'd grown up. Always by himself reading Business World or the Wall Street Journal. Smart as they came, but I thought he'd get into stocks or banking.” Sam had said Gabriel was working for George, but it just fully hit me.
“For whatever reason, he hasn't said, your brother returned to Braxton and overheard George Braun at a coffee shop talking about his search for an assistant. Gabriel applied and was one of the final candidates based on his prior experience. He'd also gotten the job because he was quite handy and could renovate Braun's cabin.” April leaned against the padded seatback and waited for me to respond.
“I'll find out more when I can talk to him, thanks. You're definitely letting him go today, right?” When April nodded, I said, “If George has an angry wife, then maybe you have a new suspect.”
April said, “I'm considering all leads right now. Are you okay with everything else we talked about yesterday? The Castiglianos, the drug case I need to investigate?”
Truthfully, I hadn't much time to think about it. I still didn't know where Francesca had escaped to next. I needed to check in with Vincenzo to see if he knew anything additional about his daughter's whereabouts. Since it seemed like April didn't realize Francesca was still alive, I told her I was fine. “I'm not sure I can help with the Paddington and Castigliano drug connection, and I don't spend a lot of time with my former in-laws. They're in my life only because they're Emma's grandparents.”
“I understand. I don't need anything from you right now, but if the time comes, I was hoping I could count on you,” April added as someone knocked on the door.
“Okay, we can chat in the future,” I consented, knowing I was only able to focus on one shock at a time. “I would like some time alone with my brother.”
April opened the door. Detective Gilkrist, Sam, and Gabriel were waiting in the hallway. “It's really you,” I said.
April gave me the use of her office for as long as I needed it. She and her detective brought Sam back to finalize his statement confirming anything he knew regarding George Braun. Before he left, Sam hugged Gabriel. “Give him a chance, babe. I'll wait for you in the parking lot.”
Once Sam left, Gabriel turned to me. While there was something different about him, many things hadn't changed. He was still five nine, the same height as me. He still had dirty blond hair like me. Where I'd cut mine short recently, he'd let his grow out, so it curled around his ears and at the back down his neck. He looked a little worse for the wear, but he had the same innocent smile and angelic hope in his eyes. “I've missed you, brother,” I said with misty eyes as I hugged him tighter than I ever had before.
Gabriel hugged me back just as hard. “I'm sorry. I shouldn't have left the way I did. It had nothing to do with you.”
After Gabriel assured me that he was fine, we talked about his relationship with George Braun. “It was pure luck. I'd only been in town for a couple of weeks. Sam and I had met the night before and enjoyed a couple of drinks. We stayed up to watch the sunrise over the Wharton Mountains and stopped at a coffee shop on the way back. After breakfast, Sam took off for class and I stuck around.”
“And that's when you overheard George talking on the phone about needing an assistant?” I pieced together what April had shared and what my brother was starting to tell me. Gabriel had heard enough on the call about what George was looking for and located the ad posted on a local job site. He updated his resume, applied, and was called by the recruiting company right away. He'd matched his resume to exactly what George had said on the call, so he was a shoo-in.
“Smart thinking. I assume you actually knew how to do everything he required?” I'd never known my brother to lie. He was almost too truthful in the past.
“I'm not a kid anymore, Kellan. I've done a few things I'm not proud of. Sometimes you have to push the boundaries if you want to achieve a goal.” Gabriel's face took on a darker tone, and in those few seconds, it became clear my brother was hiding something from me.
“Did you have anything to do with George's death?”
“Do you think I did?” As Gabriel stretched his back, his shirt sleeve rose a little higher on his arm. I noticed a colorful tattoo on his upper bicep. It was a circle broken into four separate pie-shaped quadrants, each dyed a different color. There was a word listed on the outer perimeter of each quarter—honor, knowledge, love, and respect. He'd spent more time at the gym since we'd last saw one another eight years ago. Gabriel had been scrawny in the past. Even though I wasn't as built as I am now, I could still pin him to the ground anytime we'd wrestled or played football with our friends.
I didn't want to believe my brother could commit murder, but a lot of time had passed since I'd last seen him. “When did you get the job?”
“I interviewed with him the next day. It was down to me and one other person. When he talked about his cabin, I clinched the deal by offering to fix it up in exchange for a place to sleep for a few months. I made it so he couldn't say no to me.” There was a slightly wicked smile forming on his face.
“Do you know any reason why someone might have killed him?” I asked my brother, feeling my stomach tighten over his purposefully vague and shady answers.
He shook his head and told me the same thing he'd told the sheriff and Detective Gilkrist. “Nope, George was always kind to me. I spent a good chunk of my time running lab experiments for him in the first week, but then he asked me to focus on the flower show. I planned the whole thing for him.”
“Have you met Millard Paddington? He's the guy sponsoring the event.” I wondered if Millard had been keeping Gabriel's secret from me.
“Nah, I only worked behind the scenes. George gave me specific assignments to coordinate shipments, work with vendors, and sometimes interface with an event company who's doing the guest relations.” Gabriel yawned, then apologized for being so tired. He'd been working too much lately and hadn't gotten a lot of sleep. “We done here?”
I felt bad for pushing him, but he was connected to all the bizarre events happening around me. As soon as he said there was an event company, I remembered I hadn't asked the sheriff if she'd found anything out from her interview with Cheney Stoddard. “What company was that?”
“Simply Stoddard. I worked with someone named Karen who was the account manager overseeing the flower show,” Gabriel explained. “Is that important?”
Things were getting clearer for the first time. “Maybe. I'm not sure how it fits in, but it can't be a coincidence,” I said, then explained what I'd known about each of the Stoddards.
“I only spoke to Karen on the phone. George spent most of the time with her, but occasionally I had to help. I don't know anyone named Doug, Sierra, or Cheney,” my brother added.
Gabriel indicated he needed to use the men's room. We left the sheriff's office, an
d I waited for him in the lobby. April was heading out but stopped by my bench. “I'm off to meet with Cheney Stoddard. He was out of town with his sister yesterday and just got back to me this morning. Then I'll swing by Paddington's Play House to garner anything else I can from Yuri Sato. I appreciate the tip.” As she left, she yelled back, “Good luck patching things up with your brother. Go easy on him. I'm sure you know what it's like when you first come back home.”
For the first time since I'd known April Montague, it felt like she was warming up to me. Maybe we could find a way to be friends in the future. Perhaps that's why I had such an odd reaction in her office the other day when we were looking at the photo of the knife on her monitor.
The Stoddards, George Braun, and my brother had all come to town around the same time and been involved with an exhibition completely new to Braxton. Between Karen working on the flower show and Cheney's run-in with George, there had to be something I was missing. Sierra living in London and George previously working in Switzerland sounded like an angle to follow up on. Ursula's parents worked with flowers and had found a cure, but it had been lost forever when she accidentally caused the explosion. Could someone have figured out what the Mücks had discovered years ago and was now trying to recreate it? If they were, it'd be amazing to help people recover from an awful disease. Then it hit me—what if they were only trying to profit financially from the discovery?
Gabriel returned from the bathroom anxious to catch up with Sam. He promised to explain why he'd left town in the first place but begged to get some rest. “I'm not ready to see everyone else. Can you give me a couple of days?”
Although I didn't like the idea of hiding his return from our family, I was afraid if I said no, Gabriel would run away again. “Sure, but where are you going to stay? I doubt you can live at George Braun's cabin now that he's dead and the police know about the place. It'll be off-limits to everyone.”
“You're right. I only have some clothes there. I keep everything else in my car. Sam's gonna take me back to it, and then I'm gonna crash at the boarding house over in Woodland where I stayed before I met George.” Gabriel left the sheriff's office and walked to Sam's car in the parking lot. When he arrived, Sam kissed my brother like he had the first time I'd seen them together.
I gave them a moment alone before walking toward them. “How do I reach you, Gabriel?”
Sam looked at my brother. “You promised you'd make an effort to trust your family again, right?” When Gabriel nodded, Sam sent me a text message with Gabriel's number. I'd already had Sam's number from earlier in the year when I was helping his grandmother, Gwendolyn Paddington.
“Lunch tomorrow?” I asked Gabriel.
“I guess that'll work. I've got no job at this point. Why not push off my search for a couple of hours so we can catch up,” he replied.
An idea began to formulate in my head. “Do you still want to work on the flower show?”
“Of course. I'd love to see it through.” Gabriel perked up. “It's important I get a job quickly.”
Sam and I looked at one another and smiled. Sam said, “I never thought of asking Uncle Millard to assist. I haven't told them anything about what's going on in my life. They still think I'm figuring out the next steps after graduating from Braxton. But Kellan could.”
“I'll talk with Millard tonight. I'm sure he'll be willing to give my brother his job back once he knows Gabriel was doing a lot of the work for George before he died. Millard has a friend volunteering her time, but I think she's left town to visit with her sister.” I didn't bother explaining to Gabriel that Lissette was going to be staying with our Aunt Deirdre who might also be home for a visit soon. I couldn't overwhelm my brother with the whole family at once.
“You'd do that for me?” Gabriel asked. When I confirmed, he hugged me again and promised to meet me for lunch the following day. I agreed to find a remote place since he didn't want anyone to know he was back. “You have no idea what I've been through the last few months. A man has limits.”
After Sam, Gabriel, and I left the sheriff's office, they dropped me off on campus to pick up my car. I called Millard and told him all about Gabriel. I left out my brother's connection with Sam and begged Millard to keep quiet about Gabriel's return for now. He offered to meet for lunch the following day to work out the details. I couldn't shake my concern over the secrets my brother was keeping.
On my way to collect Emma after school, I called Vincenzo to get an update on my mysterious wife. Although talking to the man was a surefire way to sour my mood, it needed to be done. I pictured him sitting behind his beloved old banker's desk with a lit cigar in his fingers, the tip glowing like a firefly, and a Billy Joel classic kicking off his favorite Spotify playlist. “Any leads on Francesca?”
“Good of you to call. My daughter will be incredibly pleased to hear you are worried about her,” he said. 'We didn't start the fire' clearly played in the background. “How is my granddaughter? It's about time she came home, don't you think?” Although he'd grown up in the United States to American-born parents, he often spoke in a rugged, broken version of the English language I'd only seen in every stereotypical mafia movie. His voice somehow made it sound more frightening than the films.
“Emma's doing well. I am planning a trip to visit you this summer. You're always welcome to fly here, Vincenzo. I've never kept you from her.” I parked the SUV outside Emma's elementary school and watched the buses form a line outside the entrance. A crossing guard was beginning to direct traffic.
“We see this three-thousand-mile distance a little differently. When I grew up, children respected their elders. Listened to them. Honored and obeyed them. It's a pity your parents didn't teach you those lessons, Kellan. I might have to do that.” Vincenzo paused and mumbled something I couldn't understand. It probably wasn't meant for me but for one of his many hundred employees. “Eh, things change. I'm sure you realize that. Easily. One day you wake up in Pennsylvania. The next, maybe a lovely little ranch I know in Venezuela where there are more coyotes than human beings.”
“You're a funny guy… you know I'm not a huge fan of travel. I appreciate the offer, but I think I'll stay where I am for now.” Was he serious? He'd never been this obvious with death threats aimed directly at me before. “What about Francesca?”
“You tell me, Kellan. She was in your care last anyone saw her. We followed up on this lead you provided. My daughter is not in Canada anymore. Are you keeping her from me?” In a moment of near-silence, the only noise heard was the crisp pop as his cigar was relit. Vincenzo's manservant always stood a few feet away, ready to react to his boss's every whim.
“I've provided you everything I know at this point. The only two remaining places we visited together that she hasn't mailed a postcard from are Yellowstone Park and Savannah, Georgia. My guess is she's stopping there next.” I'd convinced myself she wasn't appearing in Braxton the last few times I thought I'd seen her, in particular entering the private back-offices in Memorial Library. It had to be my imagination or someone who looked like her.
“Teams will be placed there. You will know if I hear anything. Should we not be able to locate my daughter within the next week, Kellan, I trust you understand what happens next.” A loud buzzing indicated the conversation was over.
I didn't have time to deal with this situation. The Castiglianos had the resources and money to track Francesca down. Why weren't they doing more to help find her? I turned the car radio on to keep myself from thinking about anything until Emma exited the school. I flipped to the first station with a clear signal and listened to a country song about a girl who'd been kidnapped by her daddy.
Suddenly, I had an intense panic attack and a stunning revelation at the same time. It's amazing what a lack of oxygen will do to a desperate man. What if Vincenzo and Cecilia had known all along where their daughter was—in their house safe and sound. They'd faked her death once, could this be another scheme to frighten me enough that I'd be forced to move ba
ck to Los Angeles? Maybe Francesca was part of their plan to trick me and had fed them details about all the places we traveled to, so they could send someone to mail personalized postcards from each destination. They'd been sent to my office at Braxton which ensured none of my family saw them, keeping the whole thing a private affair. If they'd arrived at my house, someone else might realize the postcards came from my dead wife.
As I pondered how to prove my theory, the car door burst open and highlighted the sound of children's laughter. I'd been so distracted, I hadn't realized Emma was already finished with school and ready to leave. “How was your day?”
“Better than ever. I'm next to bring Rodney home on the weekend. Let's go to the store, Daddy,” Emma screeched at the top of her lungs. “I got some research to do, so I'm ready to handle the responsibility.”
It took me a solid thirty seconds to realize Rodney was the class pet, a rabbit who went home with a different student each weekend. “I got some research to do, so I'm ready to handle a few things, too, baby girl.” Mine didn't exactly involve rabbits, but I'd need to move as quickly as one if I wanted to solve each of the puzzles controlling my life.
Chapter 13
Emma and I spent the rest of the afternoon at the pet store talking to a friendly salesman about how to care for a rabbit. Had I thought ahead, I would've called to see if the shop had any puppies available to adopt. As luck would have it, they did. Unfortunately, it was bad luck for me. Emma cooed over a ten-week-old black and tan shiba inu that'd arrived at the store the day before. Although it was adorable, the puppy bit and growled at the glass cage. Shibas were known for their severe dislike of restraint and the word no. Did I really want to subject myself to someone or something else who didn't listen to me?
I danced around the entire topic of why we needed to wait until the summer started to properly train a puppy, but it didn't work. I still left the pet store with a very sad little girl who cried the whole car ride home. Nana D was on-hand to cheer Emma up during dinner and even kept her distracted by planning for the rabbit's weekend stay.
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