“I’m on it,” Fred said, nodding to his phone.
“What’s he doing?”
“Fred has everyone’s numbers set on his phone for emergency alerts. We used to arrange call trees, but Fred’s more effective. It’s voluntary to be put on the list, but everyone signs up. He’ll send a text alert notifying everyone to get to the school for an emergency meeting.”
Mrs. A. stood and walked over to the closet, pulling out her coat.
I turned back to the guys. “Gear up. Be ready for anything.”
They nodded, hurrying out of the room. I walked over and using my fingers, picked up a piece of cantaloupe. “How does him being here two months ago change his plans?” I asked myself, before biting into the cantaloupe.
~*~*~
I was still lost in thought when I reached for another piece of fruit and realized I had eaten it all. I turned as Grady was pulling a bullet-proof vest over my head and securing the straps.
“You know my arm is working just fine these days, right?”
“You’re in thinking mode. I didn’t want to interrupt you.”
“We better get going,” Mrs. A. said as she passed me another bowl of fruit. “Take that with you.”
“Can we take your map, too?” I asked, pointing to the wall hanging.
“Of course, dear. Whatever you need.”
Grady grabbed the framed map, and we all loaded into various vehicle to follow Fred to the school. When we got there, a hundred or more cars already filled the parking lot.
Chapter Fourteen
Following Mrs. A. into the gym, I was surprised by the crowd that had gathered. Fred offered to go to the office and get a projector while Kierson went to the front of the gym and set up his laptop on a table. Dragging a chair over, I stood on it and raised my hand to get everyone’s attention. At least two hundred people, in various states of dress, quieted to listen.
“Thank you for coming. I’m Kelsey Harrison with Silver Aces Security. Many of you know Casey Roberts. He works with us and asked us to help find his girlfriend, Laurie Simmons, who was kidnapped yesterday from her home.”
Several gasps escaped.
“That case is a police matter,” the chief of police hollered.
“By my estimate, Laurie has a matter of hours before she will be killed if she’s not dead already. The man who took her is her husband who is employed as a U.S. Marshal. He beat her regularly before she managed to escape with her son. As an investigator of violent crimes, I can promise you—he will kill her.”
The chief gasped, turning white.
“Behind me, Agent Kierson with the FBI is setting up his laptop to a projector.”
“Why is a Fed working with a civilian company?” one of the deputies asked.
“She’s not your average civilian,” Kierson answered, standing on another chair. “I’ve worked with Kelsey on several cases. She’s a profiler, and I hire her on occasion to consult on our cases. She’s that good. And the team she works with is military trained for hostage situations.” Kierson nodded for me to continue.
“We have a picture of Brian Griffith, but we just discovered he was in town late August and using the alias of Bradley Whit. We need anyone who talked with him to come forward and tell us as much as you can remember. We know he bought a blue 1996 Ford Bronco from Fred. We also know he stayed at the B&B. I’m guessing more of you will remember him. He has distinctive eyes.”
“Mean eyes,” Mable called out, pounding her cane into the gym floor.
“Yes, thank you, Mable. He has mean eyes.” I turned to glance at Kierson.
He finished adjusting the projector, pointing it at the white wall. After clicking something on his laptop, Griffith’s picture appeared. Someone turned the main light off so only the perimeter lights were on. Griffith’s eyes seemed to spear me, sending a shiver down my back. I stepped off the chair, onto the gym floor.
“I remember him, but not from two months back,” an older man called out, moving forward through the crowd. “I work part-time at a hardware store in Brighton. He was in three days ago.”
“Do you remember what he purchased?”
The man seemed to turn a bit green and raised his hand to his stomach. He shuffled closer to me so he didn’t need to shout. “He bought sheets of plastic, a small hatchet, and rope.”
The old man, and probably everyone else who heard the answer, was imagining what Griffith planned on doing with that hatchet. I, however, was stumped by the list. It didn’t make sense. Why would he want rope if he had cuffs? And if he was moving her to a remote location to dump her body, why did he need plastic? And despite not having a full profile on him, the hatchet didn’t seem his style. And why would he buy supplies in Brighton? He drove across half the country. He could have stopped anywhere. I was missing something.
“How did he pay?” I asked, looking at the old man.
“Plastic. Same as everybody else these days.”
“You’re sure? He didn’t pay with cash?”
“Only us old timers use cash. I would’ve remembered.”
That also didn’t fit. Did he create a fake credit card account just to buy the supplies? Seemed too risky.
“Can you call and have someone pull the charge card information?” Kierson asked.
“Of course,” the old man said. “The manager lives near the store. Give me five minutes.”
A young guy had moved forward and was staring at the picture.
“Do you recognize him?”
“Yup, sure do,” he said. “I’ll be damned if I can remember the where, why, and when, though.”
Two women stepped forward, pulling my attention away. “He showed up the day we took the kids on a field trip to the town library. We stopped for ice cream cones on the walk back.”
“I saw him too,” the woman next to her said. “He was watching the boys. When he noticed us look at him, he turned and left.”
“Was Caleb Simmons one of the boys?” Grady asked.
Both women nodded.
“Do you remember the date?” Bridget asked.
“August 28th,” the second woman said. “It was the second day of school, and it would’ve been around two in the afternoon.”
Bridget moved them off to the side to write down their information. I turned and saw the young man was still looking at the photo. He was rubbing the back of his neck, getting frustrated. I started toward him, when the old man shuffled back and grabbed my arm.
“This makes no sense,” the old man said, shaking his head.
“What?” I asked as the hairs on my arms rose.
“Manager says the name on the card was Casey Roberts. But I know Casey. It wasn’t him that bought that stuff. I swear it.”
“That’s it!” The young man turned to face us. “That guy was parked a few months ago on the side of the road near Casey’s ranch. I stopped to see if he needed some help, but he told me he was all good. He said he stopped to check his tires. When I started to drive away, I saw he was still standing there, looking at Casey’s place. I stopped again, staying in my truck, while I watched him. Something seemed off. He glanced up though, waved at me, then got in his SUV and drove away. He was definitely driving a blue Bronco for sure, but I don’t know about the year.”
I stepped back and grabbed Grady’s arm. “The map. I need the map.”
“Show me where Casey lives,” Grady ordered the young man as he lifted the framed map onto the table.
We all stepped around the map as the young man pointed out the quickest way to Casey’s house.
“We have to move,” I said before I ran toward the doors and the rest of the team followed. “He’s trying to frame Casey for her murder.”
~*~*~
It didn’t take us long to get to Casey’s ranch. The roads were straight, and between half the town being at the school and it being so early in the morning, there were no other cars on the road. Grady led the charge, driving ninety miles an hour.
“The ranch should b
e up ahead,” I warned Grady. “Cut the lights and pull to the side. We don’t want to spook him.”
Grady tapped the brakes twice to warn Kierson in the SUV behind us before cutting the lights and drifting the truck to the side of the road. When we stopped, we slid out, closing the doors quietly.
“Bridget, lock yourself in one of the SUVs and wait for us to call. We may need to get Laurie to the hospital as fast as possible, so look up the directions and be ready to drive. Her life may depend on it.”
Bridget grabbed Bones’ keys and walked away.
“Bones and Donovan, take the back entrance. Grady, take the garage. Kierson and I will enter through the front.”
“This is likely to turn into a hostage situation,” Donovan whispered. “Who’s going to order the kill shot?”
“Kelsey will make the call,” Kierson answered. “But because she’s a civilian, when we file the report, I’m going to take the credit.”
“You’re assuming I’ll make the right call.”
“I’m betting my career on it,” he said as we all moved down the drive toward the small ranch house.
The blinds on the house were closed, but the lights were on in the center and right side of the house. I moved up the front porch, careful to stay on the outward edge where the planks would be less likely to creak. Kierson mirrored my approach.
Glancing at the door, I noted it was steel with a steel frame. It wouldn’t be easy to kick in, which I was sure was Casey’s intention when he’d built the house. It was also likely that the other doors would be the same, and everyone would have to adjust how they entered. I moved to the left, toward the window that wasn’t illuminated. Checking the lock, I grinned, seeing it was the same style locks we had on our houses in Michigan. Pulling a jimmy tool off my vest, I slid the metal in the frame, popped the end up, and jerked the slide to the right. The latch snapped open, and I stilled to see if anyone moved into the room on the other side of the glass. Not hearing anything, I moved aside as Kierson raised the window and climbed through. I followed him into an empty bedroom. The door was closed, but we could hear Griffith on the other side.
“Your new boyfriend will go to prison for the rest of his life,” I heard Griffith say as I moved closer to the door and turned the door knob while holding the door tight in the frame. “You’ll be dead. He’ll be in prison. And my son will be with me, where he belongs.”
Feeling the latch fully retracted, I held the knob as I pulled the door open and looked in. Griffith’s back was turned to us. Laurie was sitting in a chair in front of him, sobbing and shaking. I motioned to Kierson to move as I stepped back and opened the door. I pulled my gun, aiming it at Griffith’s back as I followed Kierson. I stayed near the bedroom while he moved toward the front door.
Griffith sensed our movements and pulled Laurie from the chair by her hair as he moved the hatchet to her neck. Grady moved into the living room from the kitchen. Bones and Donovan moved in from the back hallway.
“Who the fuck are all of you?” Griffith yelled.
“They call me demonio de muerte, or so I hear,” I answered, holding my gun sight trained on him as I focused my attention on his eyes. “You have only two options here. Drop your weapon or die.”
His eyes shifted from me to the men surrounding him before turning back to me. I could see he was calculating his odds.
“Holster your weapon, Kierson,” I called out.
Griffith looked frantically between me and Kierson, jerking Laurie’s head back in the process.
“Donovan!” I called out.
Donovan fired. As the bullet exited Griffith’s forehead, his body was thrown forward. Kierson leapt toward Laurie, catching her and pulling her away from Griffith before she fell on the hatchet. She crumbled in his arms, sobbing.
Bones called Bridget while Donovan found a sheet to wrap around Laurie’s naked and damaged body. Grady carefully lifted her and carried her out to the SUV as it pulled up. The white sheet was blotched with large red patches of blood that had already seeped through. Bones climbed into the backseat of the SUV from the other side and took Laurie from Grady. As soon as the doors closed, Bridget took off like a bat out of hell down the drive.
Kierson placed his hands on his hips and turned to face me. “I’ll need to call this in and stay on scene until FBI forensics gets here.”
“I’m going to head back to the school and tell everyone it's over. Then I’ll be at the inn, sleeping.”
Kierson nodded. “I’ll send agents your way when they need your statement.”
“Best if I stay,” Donovan said. “I’m sure they’ll want to take my gun and confirm gunshot residue.”
Kierson raised the back of his hand to wipe the sweat off his forehead before turning back to me. “Nice job. I wasn’t sure why you were ordering me to holster my weapon until you called out for Donovan to take the shot. Good thing I’m quick or that hatchet would’ve ended her.”
“I had faith in you, Kierson,” I said, slugging him in the arm before walking out to join Grady.
As we walked down the driveway, Grady intertwined our fingers. “The sun’s finally coming up.”
Orange and yellow beams split through the trees and danced off the dewy grass. “It’s going to be a nice day.”
Grady chuckled. “Too bad we’re likely to sleep through most of it.”
Chapter Fifteen
As Grady drove us back to town, I called Tech.
“What do you need?” Tech yawned into the phone.
“I need you to let Casey know it’s over. We found them. Griffith is dead.”
“And Laurie?” Tech asked.
“She was in bad shape, but she should pull through. Bones and Bridget took her to the hospital.”
“Casey’s still in North Dakota. He didn’t want to go too far in case he was needed. I’ll reach out and tell him to head to the hospital.”
“It wasn’t smart of him to stay so close, but I get it. I’d probably have done the same.”
“Anything else?”
“No, we’re set. We’ll update the locals, and then I have a date with a pillow.”
“I’m going back to bed then. Later.”
Tech ended the call, and I looked up to see we’d arrived back at the school. I sighed. The parking lot was still full of vehicles. “You can stay in the truck. This shouldn’t take long,” I told Grady.
“Where you go, I go. We’re a team, remember?”
We climbed out of the truck and made our way into the school, down the hall, and into the gym. As everyone started to notice us, a hush fell over the crowd.
“She’s alive,” Grady called out.
Cheers echoed throughout the gym until it quieted again to hear more.
“She’s injured and was taken to the hospital,” I called out. “Casey is on his way and should be there soon. Griffith died during a hostage situation.”
Grady and I knew better than to stick around for the million questions, so we quickly turned and left the gym while everyone was loudly celebrating the news. On our way across the parking lot, Grady’s phone rang. I heard him purring his country charm over the phone and put enough together to know that he was trying to calm Nicholas down. I climbed in the truck and leaned my head back, closing my eyes as I listened.
“Yes, I know that usually one of us is there. But buddy, you have a whole house full of people with you, and I’ve only been gone one day. You need to learn that sometimes our work requires both of us to take off for a few days, but we’ll always come back.”
There was a long pause and another sigh from Grady. “I’ll be home as quick as I can, but until then, I want you to clean your room like I told you to do three days ago. And today is Tuesday, so you know what that means, don’t you?
“Yes, that’s right. Dusting day. You and Sara better be doing your chores because I’ll be checking when I get there.”
I grinned, listening to the conversation. I could hear Nicholas’ whine over the phone, not happy ab
out the reminder. They talked for a few more minutes before Grady hung up and started the truck.
“Dusting day?”
“I know,” Grady said, chuckling. “We could afford a housekeeper, but those kids are so damn bored most of the time, it was a two birds one stone, kind of thing. And it’s good for them. They’re old enough to pull their own weight.”
“I’m all for it. I’m hoping we find a good teacher who can break up their days a bit. It’d do both those kids wonders to spend part of their time away from their laptops.”
“Just don’t let Anne hire someone,” he grumbled. “That damn woman sees the good in everyone.”
I snorted, my eyes still closed, as I leaned my forehead against the passenger window and fell asleep.
I woke, hours later, as the tires of the plane smacked and bounced twice on the tarmac before screeching to stop the forward momentum. “What the—”
“It’s fine,” Grady said from beside me, pulling my hand into his. “We’re back in Michigan.”
“How the hell did we get here?” I asked as I sat up and looked around. I dragged a hand through my hair until it got stuck on several snarls.
Grady chuckled beside me. “You were dead to the world when we got to back to the inn so I called the pilot and loaded up our bags. Decided it didn’t matter whether I slept on the plane or at the inn, and you were already out, so what the hell.” He shrugged as he stood and pulled our bags out of the overhead cabinet. “Come on, gorgeous. Let’s get you home.”
I shuffled along after him, trying to clear my foggy brain. When we exited the airport, one of the security guys from Silver Aces was waiting to pick us up.
“Shit. I left my SUV in Detroit.”
“Kierson said he’d drive it over when the dust settled in North Dakota. Bridget is returning my truck rental, then she’ll drive back with Donovan. Bones has another job starting Friday in Nebraska, so he was going to drive South.”
“Laurie’s car? I told Marty the tow truck driver to only release it to Kierson or me.”
Day and Night Page 12
