“You think? I’m still peeling bits of my spine from the back of my lungs.” I stood slowly, rounded my desk, and extended my hand. “Let’s try this again. I’m Hugh Foster, Pastor of the Christ Is Lord Church. And you’re …?”
He grabbed my hand and shook it. It was a lot like shaking hands with a power line. “Ross MacElroy. Department of Homeland Security.”
Chapter 2
I could feel that old familiar fog of confusion wrap its suffocating tendrils around my overworked neurons and squeeze them ’til they whined. Why couldn’t anything in this town make sense? A dreadful sense of déjà vu was working itself to a fever pitch and riling up my Cheerios.
“Homeland Security? Are you sure? Absolutely sure?” Good one, Hugh. I’m sure he got up this morning and thought to himself, “Just who is it I work for? Some government job, I know. Oh, wait a minute. Homeland Security.”
His lips moved. It might have been a smile, but more than likely, he was getting ready to bite me. “Yes, Pastor Foster. I’m sure.” He reached into his jacket. I cringed. “Relax,” he said. “I’m putting my pen away.” He held his hands up in front of him. “Not gonna bite you.”
At least that was cleared up. “But why?” I said. “Is this about that mess with I.B. and his gang? Because if it is, that’s all been settled. Bristol was on duty when he shot that guy. Not the guy here at Road’s End—well, then, too, I suppose. But I mean the drug guy. The first guy he shot. And killed.” This wasn’t sounding as good as I’d hoped.
I tried again. “I’m talking about the guy they were avenging, the reason those guys came back to get him. Bristol, that is. The rest of us just sort of got in the way.” And just to nail the coffin shut on this topic, to make it all make sense and sound perfectly normal and pastor-like, I added, “And if you ask me, the guy he shot here in town that night had it coming.”
Ross couldn’t look more befuddled if I’d morphed into a Smurf.
“You know what I mean,” I continued. “He shot first. The bad guy. He and his buddies kidnapped my wife and the other ladies. Well, after we shot him, of course. I guess he might have been kind of mad about that, but still, kidnapping old ladies? From a church, for crying out loud? Don’t tell them I called them old, especially my wife, but honest to Pete, Mr. MacElroy …”
“Agent.”
“What?”
“It’s Special Agent MacElroy. But agent is fine.”
“Oh, sorry. Agent MacElroy. Anyway, what on earth would make those guys do that? On top of defacing our church? And then starting a gunfight right outside the inn?”
I stopped to breathe, and then it hit me. “Wait just a minute here. Homeland Security? Were they terrorists? Is that what I.B. and his gang really were? Terrorists?” I hung my head and put my hand over my eyes. I was saying a quick prayer, but Ross probably thought I was playing peek-a-boo with him.
I lowered my hand and looked him in the eye in that no-nonsense way pastors around the world have when they’re trying to get top secret information out of Homeland Security agents. “Are they planning something else in this town? ’Cause if they are, I gotta tell you, they’re gonna be one sorry bunch. You’d think the first time around would’ve taught ’em a thing or two.”
I was babbling; I knew it, and he knew it. He looked bored. Maybe this kind of stuff happened to him every day. Considering that badge, it probably did.
He held up his hand and shook his head. “Tell me about the Hummer.”
I snorted in a very non-pastor-like way. “They drove it here, in a raging blizzard, no less, and parked it between the church and the Inn over there. When Sherman figured out what was going on, he sneaked out of the church—sneaked, mind you. I specifically told that boy to stay inside—and blew it up.”
“That boy? A boy blew up the Hummer? In the middle of the night during a blizzard?” He was leaning over my desk toward me; I was afraid it might split in two from the weight. “You let a boy handle explosives?”
I had to admit it sounded suspect, maybe even irresponsible, at least in the world of pastors and the things they let kids do. “Well, he’s seventeen years old, eighteen by now. And no, I didn’t let him handle explosives. He had the dynamite with him in his truck. Said he blew things up all the time.”
Shut your mouth, Hugh.
“But he was protecting Sophie.”
“Where was this Sophie? Did you send her out in the blizzard to machine-gun someone?”
Very funny. “No, Sophie was in the shed. I cleaned it out earlier in the day and put new straw in there, and it seemed as good a place as any for her to spend the night.”
“You own an inn and you put Sophie in a shed? During a blizzard? What kind of pastor are you, anyway?”
That did it. “Where else would I put her? Certainly not the inn. Remember, the straw was fresh, and I wasn’t expecting Sherman to bring her. Frankly, I wasn’t even expecting him.” Then I had an afterthought. “Let alone the bad guys.” I took a breath. “Why do you have such a problem with this, anyway?”
Agent MacElroy looked apoplectic. “You put a lady in a shed overnight, and you don’t know why I have a problem with it? What kind of town is this, anyway?”
I shook my head. “Let’s not go there, Agent MacElroy. You wouldn’t believe it, anyway. What a minute—lady? No, you misunderstood me. I put Sophie in there, and believe me, she’s no lady.”
MacElroy glared at me. “I’ll give you one last chance, Pastor. Who is Sophie, and why was she in the shed?”
I had a feeling this wasn’t going to make ol’ Ross feel any better, but I had no choice. “A camel,” I sighed. “Sophie was a camel.” I let that sink in and then added, “Still is, for that matter.”
MacElroy hung his head until it rested on his massive chest. He looked defeated; I could tell this had been hard on him. “Pastor, I’m afraid to ask, but I need to know why you had a camel in your shed …” Big sigh. “… while a minor in possession of explosives blew up the Hummer right around the time Bristol Diggs shot a man and the ladies got kidnapped.” He raised his head and looked me in the eye. “And make it the short version, okay? We still have to talk about why I came here in the first place.”
I gave Special Agent MacElroy the only version I had—the long, highly improbable, but hopelessly true account of what the townspeople had taken to calling the “Road’s End Raid.” Flickers of disbelief, anguish, astonishment, and horror, mostly the latter, crossed his face as I related the events of that night. If I’d known what he was really in town for, I’d have understood what must have been going through his mind as he heard me lay out all the gory details. As it was, I simply shared his incredulity and blithely continued. I’m surprised he didn’t arrest the whole bunch of us on the spot.
By the time I finished, he was shaking his head and mumbling something about national security. My curiosity finally got the best of me. “Tell me something, Agent MacElroy.”
He looked up. I’ve seen happier people at their own funeral.
“Why are you here? What’s Homeland Security have to do with Road’s End and our church repairs?” I chuckled. “Running out of things to do?”
Ross stared at me and shook his head. “You really don’t know, do you?” He placed his hands on his knees and shoved off, towering over me once more. He tottered just a bit—probably the altitude—and I had the strangest urge to cup my hands and holler, Timber!
“Know what?”
He looked like he might try showing me pictures. See, Pastor? This is a cow. Cows give us milk. Instead he spoke louder and enunciated each word clearly. I felt like a preschooler; a deaf one, at that. “Why I’m here. Why Homeland’s involved. Why you don’t seem to know who’s coming to your daughter’s wedding.” That last part sounded a little more sarcastic than it needed to.
“What’s my daughter’s wedding have to do with anything? The last I knew, about a hundred people were coming. I don’t have the names on me, but I’m sure Mel has the list. Or Amanda. Bu
t her brothers can’t come. I know that much. One’s on a mission trip and can’t get a flight out without the assistance of twelve Sherpas and a canoe ride down the Congo River or something complicated like that, and the other one’s in the military and can’t get home. Won’t tell us why ’cause it’s top secret and all that, but then being with Homeland, you probably know something about top secret, right?”
I stood so I wouldn’t have to stare at his belt. He looked like he wanted to smother me or beat me with the same belt I was trying to avoid. “What does it matter who’s coming, anyway?””
He shook his head and waved his hand as if to shoo away a troublesome fly, or considering his size, maybe a helicopter. “I don’t mean the other people. They don’t matter. I mean you really don’t know who else, besides Senator Austin and his wife, is attending this wedding?”
I was still smarting over that they don’t matter remark, but I was curious.
“What on earth are you talking about?” Maybe the altitude was beginning to impair his judgment. “Why would Senator Austin—I’m assuming you’re talking about the Senator Austin—come to Mandy’s wedding?”
He looked at me much the way he would have had I been a pile of reeking, week-old road kill. “How much do you know about your daughter’s fiancé?”
“Jonathan? He’s twenty-eight years old, works in London. Journalism major at Penn State. That’s where they met. Well, not at first. They were both taking classes in London, then Paris, when they met initially. They work in the same office in London now, at least for a while, and they’ve known one another for about two years.” I threw my hands up in the air in mock surrender. “That’s it. I admit it. I don’t know a lot about him, but he seems like a great guy, and I trust Mandy’s judgment.”
“What’s his full name?”
“Jonathan’s? Sterling. Jonathan Sterling.”
“And his mother’s name?”
“Is this a test of some kind? ’Cause I’m not good at tests. Mrs. Sterling, I would imagine. Why don’t you just tell me what his mother’s name is?”
“Irene.”
“So?” I said. “His mother’s name is Irene Sterling. What’s that prove?”
“No, his mother’s name is Irene Austin.”
I ran my hand over my soon-to-be bald head. “And I assume you’re telling me that Irene Austin is married to Gilbert Austin? Senator Gilbert Austin? He’s Jonathan’s dad? Is that it?”
“Step.”
“What?”
“Stepdad. Gilbert Austin isn’t Jonathan’s biological father.”
I probably had the look of a man who’d been hit in the head with a frying pan one time too many. “So what? Did the senator kidnap him or something? Is it the senator who’s the terrorist?” I threw my hands up in disgust. “I don’t get it.”
“Would you get off that terrorist kick? Nobody’s a terrorist. Well, considering this town, nobody I know of. Yet.”
“But why wouldn’t Mandy tell us? Why would she keep quiet about something like that?”
“Maybe it has something to do with the crazy bunch of people in this town. Or that gang of drug dealers those old folks took on. Can’t say as I’d mention it if my husband-to-be were the son—well, stepson—of one of our most prominent United States senators, either. Probably scared he’d run the other way once he figured out what he was marrying into.”
I couldn’t argue with that. “Got me there, Agent. So, you’re telling me that Homeland Security is here because Senator Gilbert Austin is the stepfather of Jonathan Sterling?”
He nodded.
“So why do you even care?”
“Because I work for the United States Secret Service.” He let that sink in, then said, “Don’t you know who Irene Sterling is?”
I started to say something stupid. I knew it would be because every single thing I’d said that morning had stupid smeared all over it, but Agent MacElroy raised his right arm to stop me. “No, believe me. You apparently don’t. Otherwise, this would all make sense.”
I kept my mouth shut and waited for something, anything, to make sense.
And then it did.
“Jonathan’s mother, Irene Sterling Austin,” he said, “is the sister of Stuart Thomas Rogers.”
Ever the epitome of dignity, I snorted like a wild boar. “Stuart Thomas Rogers? What a coincidence …”
“It’s no coincidence, Pastor Foster. It’s that Stuart Thomas Rogers.” He shrugged, then walked to the door. Before wedging his shoulders sideways through the opening, he turned back to me and said, “The President of the United States is coming to Road’s End.”
Chapter 3
My wife isn’t in the habit of fainting, but she came close to keeling over when I told her who was coming to dinner, not to mention breakfast, lunch, the wedding, and the reception.
“My gosh, Hugh. You have to be kidding! Why didn’t Amanda say something? Are you sure? Are you absolutely positive?”
I nodded and turned to Agent MacElroy, who was standing behind me just inside the back door. “Melanie, meet Special Agent Ross MacElroy of the United States Secret Service. Sir, meet my wife, Melanie Foster.”
Ross nodded grimly and gave her a two-fingered salute. “Ma’am.”
Melanie stood gaping at me, hands on her hips in that sexy way she has every time she thinks about smacking me upside the head. “Is this some kind of a sick joke? Did one of your brothers send this guy?” She turned and wagged her finger at Ross. “Did one of Hugh’s brothers put you up to this? Because I don’t find it very funny. Not for one minute do I find it funny.” She shook her head, no doubt thinking we might get the wrong idea and think it was funny. Not a chance.
She was getting her dander up. She turned her attention to me. “Hugh, I mean it. If your brothers did this, I’ll have them drawn and quartered. I’ll turn them into mincemeat myself and serve them up at Christmas dinner.”
Ross moved closer to me as if I could somehow protect him from her wrath. “Is she serious? Is she really a pastor’s wife? Because she doesn’t sound very … I don’t know, very much like a pastor’s wife.”
“Yep, she’s the real deal. Doesn’t much care for my brothers’ jokes, though.” I cocked my head in his direction. “They didn’t send you, did they? My brothers, I mean? Because if that’s the case, I’d hightail it right out of town this instant.” I could tell he wasn’t bothered. “No, really. I mean it.”
Agent MacElroy slumped down to about eight and a half feet and shook his head. “Can’t do that, Pastor. Kind of wish I could, but I can’t. I’m the real deal and so is this situation.”
Mel, who had been switching her high-beam glare between me and the giant—up, down, up, down—sighed and surrendered in that okay you win for now but watch your back because I’m on to you, fella way she has whenever stupid things happen, which around here is almost daily. Agent MacElroy wasn’t out of the woods with her just yet.
It occurred to me to ask MacElroy if he’d ever had such a close call in the line of duty, but I decided against it. No sense scaring the poor guy half to death before I had to. Besides, he hadn’t met Sadie or Winnie or George or Dewey or any of the other senior citizen, posse-loving, Road’s End vigilantes I called neighbors. There was only so much a man, even a man as intimidating as Ross MacElroy, could take in one day.
Mel gestured toward the kitchen table and pulled out a chair. “Have a seat, Agent … MacElroy, is it? Let’s talk. Coffee?”
He nodded.
“Mel makes a great …”
Ross raised his finger to stop me in my tracks. Then I remembered. “Oh, I forgot. You probably already knew that, didn’t you?”
Ten minutes and two cups of coffee later, Ross and I had pretty much explained away our respective mysteries. The phone rang; Melanie disappeared into the dining room to answer it then came back and handed it to me. I hate phones. I hate phone calls, and I especially hate dealing with whatever bit of trouble inevitably scoots its way through the phone lin
es to aggravate me.
I sighed, then took the call. “Pastor Foster.”
“Colonel Pastor? We’ve got trouble.”
Of course, we’ve got trouble. We’ve always got trouble in Road’s End. “What’s up, Grace? What kind of trouble?” Worse than the President of the United States is coming to Road’s End trouble? Worse than my daughter is marrying into the First Family and holding her wedding in the black hole of the universe where any sense of normalcy gets sucked into oblivion kind of trouble?
“Worse than any of that.” Grace has an uncanny way of reading my mind. “Your ten o’clock appointment is here. The inspector, remember?”
“Oh, good grief. No, I didn’t remember. Tell him I’ll be right over, okay?”
“Too late. She’s heading your way, and she’s not happy.”
“She?”
“She. Ms. Hilda Stutgardt.” Grace chuckled. “Not happy at all. Fact is, she kinda reminds me of a lady version of someone you just met.”
Just gets better and better.
Chapter 4
Grace was right. Hilda Stutgardt reminded me a lot of Special Agent MacElroy, tall and big-boned, but sad to say, not as pretty. She was a sturdy woman, and if she’d been a food item, I’d classify her as a large, crusty loaf of multi-grain bread. You just knew by looking at her that she could hold her own and wouldn’t get soggy right off the bat when up to her neck in hot water. I’m not implying she was unattractive, just that she had that watch out I can ruin your life beauty that usually scares me witless. Grace was also right about her not being happy.
“Pastor Foster, I presume?” she said after pounding on the back door ’til it rattled.
I held out my hand and smiled. “That’s me. Miss Stutgardt, is it?”
“Ms.”
“Sorry. Ms. Stutgardt. Thanks for stopping by. Sorry about the mix-up.”
Faux Pas (A Road's End Mishap Book 2) Page 2
