by Cindi Myers
“There must be something in those files,” Brenda said. “Something we forgot or overlooked.”
“It doesn’t matter now,” Lacy said. “The files are gone. Destroyed by the bomb.”
“It’s horrible to think it, but all this violence must mean you’re getting close to finding the real killer,” Brenda said. “Otherwise, why go to so much trouble to stop you?”
“We thought it must have something to do with Hake Development, because that was Andy’s biggest client,” Lacy said. “But what if that’s not it at all? After all, he had lots of clients. Maybe it’s something small that we aren’t thinking of at all.”
“I still have Andy’s computer,” Brenda said. “I haven’t turned it on since he died—I don’t even know if it still works.”
Jan and Lacy stared at her. “Why didn’t you say something before?” Lacy asked.
“I didn’t think of it,” Brenda said. “Andy kept hard copies of everything. I figured anything important would be in his files.”
“He probably had copies of a lot of stuff on his computer,” Lacy said, excitement growing. “And if you haven’t even turned it on in years, it should be just fine.”
“I promise I’ll take it to Travis first thing tomorrow,” Brenda said.
“Better let him come to you,” Jan said. “I wouldn’t take a chance going anywhere with anything the killer might want.”
“If Travis is okay,” Lacy said.
Lacy’s parents returned to the living room with a tray of cups and a coffeepot. “I turned on the radio to see if we could get a news report and find out what’s going on,” her father said. “But I couldn’t find anything.”
“Lacy, you have Travis’s phone number, don’t you?” her mother asked.
“Yes,” she said. “I called him on it earlier.”
“Have you tried calling him since all this has happened?”
“Mom, he’ll be too busy to talk—” She fell silent, heart leaping in her chest. She laughed at her own foolishness and pulled out her phone. She didn’t care if Travis yelled at her for interrupting him while he worked, as long as he answered.
She punched in his number and waited while the call connected and the ringer buzzed—once, twice, three times. “This is Sheriff Travis Walker. Leave a message at the beep.”
She had heard the expression “crushed” before, but had never fully comprehended what it meant. She felt as if someone had dumped a truckload of bricks in the middle of her chest. She ended the call without leaving a message. “No answer,” she said.
Brenda leaned over and squeezed her hand. “Don’t give up hope,” she said.
“I won’t.” Lacy took a deep breath and straightened. Three years in prison had taught her how to survive when things looked bleak—the only difference now was that so much more was at stake.
* * *
TRAVIS WAITED UNTIL Gage and Dwight were in position, then exited the Toyota. He wore a pack that contained blankets, a first-aid kit and water, and had unholstered his duty weapon and held it in his right hand. Eddie still hadn’t moved, though a second check through the binoculars had revealed no pooling blood or obvious injuries. Still, he could be bleeding out from a chest wound or a gut shot and they might not be able to tell.
Gage signaled that they were ready and Travis began moving around to the west. His plan was to move far to the side, then rush in low, with Gage and Dwight laying down a screen of fire aimed at the hills within firing distance of Eddie. It wasn’t the best plan in the world, but it was the only one he had right now. He could have waited for a helicopter or an armored vehicle from a neighboring department, but arranging that kind of backup could take hours, and Eddie might not have that kind of time.
He was halfway to the cover of the first storage unit, where Dwight waited, when his phone rang. He ignored it and silenced the phone. Everyone he needed to talk to was here right now and had better ways of communicating with him.
He stopped when he reached Dwight, who had been scanning the hills above the site with a pair of binoculars. “See anything?” Travis asked.
“Nothing.” He lowered the glasses. “Could be our shooter is gone.”
“Maybe.” If he was, that meant they had lost their chance to pin him down, but it also meant it would be easier to get help for Eddie. He put his hand on Dwight’s shoulder, the hard edge of the tactical vest beneath his palm. “You ready?”
“Ready.”
Travis looked across at Gage, who nodded in acknowledgment, then took a deep breath. “Okay. I’m going out there.”
He ran bent over, on a zigzagging path that was supposed to make it harder for a shooter to target him. Behind him, bullets ripped from the magazines of the two ARs fired by his deputies in a deafening blast. Travis couldn’t tell if anyone returned fire or not, though no rounds hit the dirt around him—and more important, none hit him.
The shooting stopped as he knelt beside Eddie. He put a hand on the younger man’s back and relief left him shaking as he felt the steady rise and fall of his breath. “Eddie.” He shook the body. “Eddie, wake up.”
Eddie groaned. Travis knelt in front of him and shoved him over. The younger man landed heavily on his back with a groan.
The first thing he noticed was that Eddie’s nose looked broken. It was definitely crooked, with blood crusting around the nostrils, purpling bruises under both eyes. More blood seeped from a gash in the middle of his forehead. That might explain why the young man was unconscious. So what had happened? Had they gone to all this trouble because Eddie was clumsy and had tripped and knocked himself out?
Then Travis saw the wound—a dark, round hole in his shoulder, rimmed with blackish blood. He pressed on the wound and more blood seeped out, and Eddie groaned and stirred. His eyelids fluttered and he stared up at Travis. “Sheriff?” he asked hoarsely, and tried to sit up.
Travis pushed him back down. “Lie still,” he said. “I’m going to call in the paramedics.”
Thirty seconds later, a pair of paramedics swarmed around the wounded young man. Gage and Dwight, weapons in hand, emerged from the cover of the storage units and joined the growing crowd of law enforcement personnel who were milling around the area. “Get these people out of here,” Travis said to Gage. “They could be compromising a crime scene.”
“So he was shot,” Dwight said.
“At least once, in the shoulder,” Travis said. “Hit his head pretty good and broke his nose, too. That may be what knocked him out.”
“What was he doing out here?” Dwight asked.
“Oh, he’s going to explain all that, I promise,” Travis said.
“My guess is he came out to look at the bomb site,” Gage said. “He was hoping to be a hero and find something the arson investigator or the rest of us missed.”
“So whoever set the bomb was guarding the place?” Dwight asked. “Why? There can’t be anything in those ashes worth finding.”
“I don’t know,” Travis said. “Maybe extra insurance? They’re so paranoid they don’t want to leave anything to chance?”
“Nobody is that paranoid,” Gage said.
“You never worked for a big corporation, did you?” Dwight asked. “Or the government—especially the military. Some of those people are majorly paranoid.”
“Ian Barnes was in the military,” Travis said. “Maybe he’s that paranoid. We’d better find out where he was and what he was doing when Eddie was shot.”
A second team of paramedics wheeled a gurney over the rough ground to Eddie and lifted him onto it. One of the original first responders joined Travis, Gage and Dwight. “The bullet is still in him, but he’s stable,” he said. “We’ll know more when they get some X-rays but my guess is he’ll be okay.”
“What about the head injury and his nose?” Travis asked.
The paramedic grinned. “He said
he was trying to run for cover when he tripped and hit a big rock. Broke his nose and knocked himself clean out.”
“It’s a miracle the shooter didn’t take the opportunity to finish him off,” Gage said.
“Maybe he thought he had killed him and didn’t want to stick around and find out,” Dwight said.
“Or maybe killing him wasn’t the point,” Travis said. “Maybe he was just sending a warning.”
“Yeah,” Gage said. “After all, Eddie wasn’t in uniform. He wasn’t driving a police vehicle. The shooter probably didn’t know he’s a cop.”
Travis watched as the paramedics strapped Eddie onto the gurney and fitted an oxygen mask over his face. He waited until they had rolled him away toward the ambulance before he moved over to examine the place where he had fallen. By now most of the other law enforcement personnel had moved on, but he had no doubt that within a couple of hours everyone in the county would have heard about the reserve officer who had knocked himself out fleeing from a shooter. Hound Dog might never live that story down.
“Here’s where he hit his head,” Gage said, nudging a cantaloupe-sized chunk of granite with the toe of his boot.
“There’s some scuff marks here, like this was where he was standing when he was hit,” Dwight said, indicating an area on the edge of the scorch marks where the Stensons’ storage unit had once stood.
Travis moved to stand beside him, and stared up into the hills. He pointed to clump of pinion trees about halfway up the slope. “What do you think? In there somewhere?”
Gage squinted up toward the area Travis indicated, then nodded. “Yeah, I think so. Good cover, shade, a good view of this area, a good angle to shoot, with the sun behind you or directly overhead most of the day, after it came up over that ridge there.”
“About two hundred yards,” Dwight said. “You’d have to have a high-powered rifle and be a good shot.”
“I could make it,” Gage said. “So could you. So could a lot of people.”
“All right. Let’s go up there and see what we can find,” Travis said, and led the way up the slope.
* * *
ADELAIDE KINKAID TELEPHONED Lacy at four thirty. “Travis is fine,” she said. “Though when I see him, I’m going to read him the riot act for not letting me know himself. I had to find out from Pamela Sue Windsor, over at the hospital in Junction, when she called to get Eddie Carstairs’s insurance information. That fool Eddie was up there, poking around at the bomb site where he had no business being, and got himself shot.”
Lacy didn’t know or care who Pamela Sue Windsor or Eddie Carstairs were. “Travis is okay?” she asked, collapsing back against the sofa. Around her, her parents and Jan and Brenda broke into relieved smiles.
“He’s fine,” Adelaide said. “He and Gage and Dwight are still out there, investigating the scene. Eddie is fine, too. They’re operating to remove the bullet and they have to set his broken nose because the fool tripped on a rock and knocked himself out while he was trying to run away. I swear, that rock is probably smarter than he is. I’ll tell Travis you called when he comes in. Or maybe I’ll leave him a note, since it’s almost time for me to go home.”
“Oh, no, don’t tell him,” Lacy said. “Please don’t.” She was embarrassed to have him know how panicked she had been at the idea of him hurt or dead. Whatever was between them felt too new—too fragile for that.
“Have it your way, dear. I have to go now. I have a few more calls to make. I think I remember that Eddie has a girlfriend over in Delta—I’ll need to get in touch with her and hold her hand a little. These men have no consideration.”
Lacy slipped the phone back into her pocket and realized everyone in the room was looking at her. “He’s fine,” she said. “It was another officer who was hurt, but he’s going to be okay.”
“You have to know more than that,” Jan said. “We want the whole scoop. What happened?”
“I don’t know.” Lacy held out her hand to stave off the chorus of protests. “I really don’t. Adelaide said this other officer—Eddie—was out at the storage units and someone shot him. And I guess he tripped and fell and broke his nose and knocked himself out, but I guess he was able to call for help before that.” She shook her head. “That’s all I know, really.” And Travis was okay. She knew that—and that was really the most important fact. The only one she cared about.
“I’m glad I decided to have a yard sale instead of renting a storage unit,” Jan said. “Who knew they could be so hazardous.”
“I think the sooner I get Andy’s computer out of my house, the better I’ll feel,” Brenda said. “Whatever was in those files of his, someone wanted to protect the information badly enough to try to kill me and Lacy and Travis and now this Eddie fellow.”
“Maybe they did kill Andy,” Lacy said.
Jan stood. “Come on. We’ll go get the computer now and take it to the sheriff’s office,” she said.
“Maybe you should wait and have Travis or one of his deputies go with you,” George said.
“I’ll go with you,” Lacy said.
“Lacy—” Her mother managed to freight the one word with a wealth of worry.
“It’s better than sitting around here,” Lacy said. “It will be fine. I promise.” And if they timed their arrival at the sheriff’s department right, she might even run into Travis, and be able to see for herself that he was all right.
Chapter Thirteen
“I still can’t believe you’re only just now mentioning that you had Andy’s computer,” Jan said as she followed Brenda and Lacy into Brenda’s house. “You knew the sheriff was looking for any information Andy might have had.”
“I simply forgot it existed,” Brenda said. “I was in the basement the other day, looking for that box of fossils I told you my father had given me—you remember we talked about using them in that ancient history display at the museum. I pulled a big plastic storage container out from under the stairs and when I opened it, I realized it was full of stuff from Andy’s office. I thought everything was out at the storage unit, but apparently not. The computer was sitting right on top of everything else. I suppose whoever packed the stuff up for me thought I would want it here, but I’m not sure I ever knew I had it.”
“If it’s been safely packed away all this time, I’m sure it still works,” Lacy said. “And computer files should be easier to search than paper ones.”
“That doesn’t mean there’s going to be anything useful on it,” Jan said.
“No,” Lacy agreed. “But maybe it will help.”
“I’ll just go down in the basement and get it out of the storage box,” Brenda said, crossing the kitchen to a set of stairs that led down. “You two can wait up here.”
“I’ll go,” Jan said. “I know it’s upsetting for you to see Andy’s things.”
“It was a shock, seeing them yesterday,” Brenda said. “But I’m over that now. After all, it’s been over three years. I’m not going to break down because I see an old law book that used to belong to him.”
“Still, I’m sure I can go right to it, you’ve described the location so well.” Jan moved past Brenda and Lacy to the top of the stairs. “Why don’t you open a bottle of wine for us?” she said as she started down the stairs.
Lacy and Brenda’s eyes met. “Is Jan always this bossy?” Lacy whispered.
“Jan is the type of person who likes to be in charge of any project,” Brenda said. She opened a kitchen cabinet and pulled out three tall glasses. “Understanding that has helped me get along with her at work. I think instead of wine, we should have iced tea. I don’t think we all want to show up at the sheriff’s office with alcohol on our breaths.”
While Brenda filled glasses with ice, Lacy descended the stairs to the basement. “Did you find it?” she called. She rounded the corner and spotted Jan bent over a large blue plastic bin.
Jan snapped the lid back onto the bin, then pulled a laptop computer off the shelf next to her. “I’ve been thinking,” she said. “Maybe I should talk to that reporter—Alvin Exeter.”
Just the mention of Alvin made Lacy’s stomach churn. “Why would you want to do that?”
“Maybe if someone appeared to cooperate with him, he’d give up this crazy idea of portraying you as guilty.” She led the way up the stairs. “I wouldn’t tell him anything much about you, personally. I’d focus on the town, how much of a shock the crime was—and, of course, how we all knew all along that you couldn’t possibly have murdered Andy.”
Lacy couldn’t help but wonder where “all” these people who knew she was innocent had been during her trial, but she could see little point in bringing that up now. “You’re free to talk to whoever you like,” she said, “but I doubt if you’ll change his mind about anything. He strikes me as a generally nasty person.”
Brenda met them at the top of the stairs. “I see you found the laptop.” She reached out and Jan handed it over.
“There are actually several bins of things from Andy’s office down there,” Jan said. “I peeked in a couple of them and there are some books that might be worth some money if you want to sell them. And I saw a couple of photographs you might want to donate to the museum. I’ll come over one day and we can go through them, if you like.”
“Sure,” Brenda said. “That would be great.” She set the computer on the kitchen table and handed Lacy and Jan glasses of tea. “I decided we could wait on the wine until after we stop by the sheriff’s department,” she said.
“We don’t have to all go see the sheriff,” Jan said. “When I leave here I’ll take Lacy home, then drop this off on the way to my house.” She opened the computer. “We ought to see if this turns on, don’t you think?” Before Brenda could answer, she pressed the power button and the computer hummed to life.
