The most curious detail was that the entire staff of prison guards seemed shocked by his murder, which meant that no one had heard the gunshot.
They were dealing with an experienced killer, someone who had a silencer on the end of the gun barrel.
Drake Kramer came to mind. As the owner of the one shooting range in town, he was likely an expert in firearms and could probably get his hands on just about any weapon.
Scott filled the doorway and stared at her. It wasn’t easy meeting his gaze, but she managed, as he gradually neared her. She stood so she wouldn’t have to look up at him.
“I don’t like that you’re here,” he said in a low tone. “Not after what happened last night.”
She couldn’t believe he would dare coddle her, except that “coddling” didn’t exactly capture his attitude. His comment had seemed more like a warning.
“I’m not going to stop living my life,” she asserted, though in a hushed tone.
“And what part of your life involves going to a prison?”
She tried to stare him down, but it wasn’t working. “You’re overlooking the part where no one would know Grant had been murdered if I hadn’t come here and barged in. So, you’re welcome.”
A staring match ensued, but all Kate felt was regret that he had moved out of their home.
“What time was he killed?” she asked.
Scott cocked his head. “I’m not telling you that.”
“I assume you’ll check all the security footage? It shouldn’t be difficult figuring out who did this.”
“I know how to do my job,” he snapped. “Let’s talk about the security footage at your house.”
“What about it?”
“How many times have I asked you to remember to do things like set the alarm and check those cameras periodically?”
Her eyes widened, as she grasped his point.
“The camera at your front door hasn’t recorded a thing in the last three months.”
“And that’s my fault?”
“It doesn’t help matters,” he pressed. “We have no idea who shot at you—”
“Colombia & Partners—”
“That’s not a person, that’s a business. I can’t arrest a business.”
“Well, have you even looked into it?”
“Garrison got your statement,” he said, changing topics. “You’re free to go.” As she neared the door, he said, “You shouldn’t be alone in that house.”
“That was your doing,” she said without looking at him.
“Can you get Jared to stay with you until I catch whoever tried to shoot down your door?”
She wanted to laugh at his concern, but it only made her feel hollow. Frowning, she touched eyes with him, and then hurried down the long corridor.
It was fast approaching six when she drove beyond the prison gates. She was starving. Carly’s offer to have dinner sprung to mind, but she didn’t want to get comfortable, have a glass or two of wine, and head off to Drake’s Firing Line overly relaxed. But she did have to eat.
When she reached an intersection, she pulled onto the shoulder and threw her truck in park. Carly was the first contact in her favorites, so she tapped the LCD screen and pressed her cell to her ear.
“It’s me,” she said as soon as Carly picked up. “Feel like getting a quick bite at Bean There?”
“Yes!” she said with a sense of urgency, though Kate could hear Larry complaining in the background. They probably had dinner plans and Kate was infringing. “Oh, it’s fine, Larry,” said Carly, away from the receiver. “Should I head over now?”
“Yeah, it’ll take me about twenty minutes, but I’ll see you there.”
Dust was settling over Rock Ridge by the time Kate eased her truck along the curb in front of Bean There. The coffee shop was all lit up inside, and when Kate quickly swept her eyes through the windows, scanning for reporters, she only saw a few and they looked too tired to harass her.
She found Carly at one of the tables in the back. Her friend leapt out of her chair and threw her arms around Kate, holding her in a tight hug.
“Don’t say you’ve been worried about me,” she groaned, though the hug was exactly what she needed.
When Carly let her go, she shot Kate a perturbed look and settled into her chair.
“I ordered you a chicken sandwich and a salad and a bowl of gazpacho,” she said, showcasing the items on the table. “And a large cup of coffee.”
Kate started with the coffee. If she were going to get through an evening at Drake’s Firing Line without getting caught, she would need her wits about her. She gulped down the coffee, ignoring how hot it was, and then picked up a fork to get started on her salad.
Carly bit into her sandwich, but after a chewing and swallowing, asked, “Does Scott have any leads on who attacked you last night?”
Kate realized that a meal with her friend meant she would have to divulge all the things she would rather forget about, so she kept her answer brief. “At this point, no. The good news is I got Jason a great lawyer.”
“Good. I just want everything to go back to normal,” she sighed. “Those two years we had without an incident went by way too fast.”
The conversation meandered from Jason to Carly’s shop, Sunshine Florist, and culminated in a long discussion about the amusement park, which was rumored to open in just a few days’ time. Though Kate found the news alarming, she was relieved that Carly hadn’t heard about Grant Conover. She didn’t feel like explaining how it was humanly possible to have stumbled upon another dead body. If there were an award for such a thing, Kate would’ve won it twice over.
As they finished their meal, Clara, the barista and owner of Bean There, sauntered over with a plate of pastries and cookies.
“Ladies,” she said, bending to slide the plate on their table in exchange for clearing their dirty dishes. “On the house.”
“Thanks!” Carly exclaimed and stuffed a cookie into her mouth.
“You’re in a good mood,” said Kate, gazing up at her and the funky streaks of brightly colored hair flowing out of her high ponytail.
“Always in a good mood to see customers,” she said, glaring at the two reporters who were seated at another table. Leaning in, Clara whispered, “These reporters are driving away my customers. People are afraid to come in, relax, and talk openly. So I’ve been giving as many freebies as I can afford, you know, to keep the residents coming back.”
Kate felt her pain then cringed at the thought of doing an on-camera interview with Bart Vaughn. The very idea made her skin crawl.
“You guys take care,” she said, straightening up. “And come back real soon, okay?”
Once Clara had returned to the counter at the front of the store, Kate popped a Danish into her mouth, rising to her feet and mumbling, “I should get going.”
Joining her, Carly walked her out to her truck.
“I’m not sure if it’s anything,” Carly began, “but Larry told me he happened to be driving along Rock Ridge Boulevard last night around the time of the shooting. Honestly, I debated telling you, because Kate, you have a knack for investigating and it puts you in dangerous situations....”
“Tell me, Carly. Any detail could help.”
“All right, but you have to promise me you won’t do anything risky.”
Kate had no idea how to promise that, but she nodded anyway.
“Larry said the roads were clear, you know, like they always are when it’s late. But as he was approaching your driveway there was an oncoming SUV. He didn’t see it come from your driveway, but he couldn’t be sure it didn’t.”
“An SUV? What color? Did he catch the make and model? A license plate number?”
“It was black and he didn’t get the plate number, but he said he thought it was an Escalade. It wasn’t all beat up like most of the cars around here, either. Larry said it looked new and it had tinted windows, or so he thought. It was dark, so he could’ve been wrong.”
K
ate doubted Larry would be wrong about such a detail. He had always had a keen eye for cars and probably would’ve become a mechanic if he hadn’t joined the fire department and then taken over his father’s hardware store.
She thanked Carly, and when she climbed into her truck, the first thing she did was push the button for the clock on the dashboard to light up and give her the time.
It was 8:30 p.m. on the nose.
She gave a honk, pulling out into the street, then started off driving south towards Drake’s Firing Line. If she got there early, she could better plan how she would sneak into the range undetected and, God willing, eavesdrop on Becky’s meeting.
The thought of being in the same room as Becky both set her teeth on edge and made her heart race with excitement. She watched her speed as she drove. The thrilling notion of catching Becky had given her a heavy foot, but soon she was turning off the main road into the wide parking lot in front of the shooting range.
She felt like a sitting duck in her clearly marked Mrs. Fix It truck, so she kept her foot on the gas, driving through the crowded parking lot until she found a vacant space at the very back.
She had a solid ten minutes before the meeting, but she guessed the attendees might already be here. After padding to her truck bed, she opened her tool kit and glanced over the options. She couldn’t very well walk in the front door, and remembering the busted back door at Justina’s building had given her an idea. She selected two screwdrivers, both the Phillips- and flat-heads, and stuffed them in her pockets. Her eye caught the miscellaneous crowbar that had been living in the bed of her truck for as long as she could remember. Though it would be highly conspicuous to stalk around the outside of the building with a crowbar in hand, she grabbed it anyway.
Her heart was in her throat, nearing the far side of the building. She kept her eyes on the entrance as customers floated in and out.
Before she reached the corner of the building to slip out of sight, a black SUV caught her eye. It was parked three cars in from where she was slowing her step. From her vantage point, she could only make out its color and size. But she was curious. She trusted Larry’s recollection as explained by Carly.
Staying low to the ground, she bounded towards the vehicle. It certainly wasn’t winter-weathered and beat up like the majority of cars and trucks in Rock Ridge, a working-class town. Just as Carly had described, the SUV was new with a shiny coat of paint and gleaming hubcaps.
She checked the entrance door of the shooting range, slowly peering over the hood of the SUV. If this was the shooter’s vehicle, then it meant that the shooter was inside. She would have to be extra careful not to be seen by anyone.
Quietly, she grabbed her cell phone from her overalls and duck-walked around to the front bumper, cuing up the camera app on her cell as she went.
She snapped three photos of the license plate and then rushed around the corner of the building. Resting her back against the brick siding, she took a moment to catch her breath before continuing on along the side of the shooting range.
There were a number of windows spanning the wall, so she crouched every time she came to one. There was no telling what rooms the window belonged to or who was inside.
When she reached the back of the building, the muffled pops and bangs coming from within the shooting range grew louder, and she realized it was because the back door was ajar. There were two dumpsters on either side, but the door was much taller and clearly cracked by a good four inches.
She checked the time on her cell phone. It was nearly nine o’clock. The meeting would be starting any second.
Jogging, she arched around the first dumpster and then peered through the open door. The light inside was dim, but she got the sense it was a storage area. Her sneaker tapped down on the cement floor, as she stepped as soundlessly as possible inside a narrow aisle, the shelves on either side stocked with boxes upon boxes of ammunition.
As she neared the end of the aisle that couldn’t have been deeper than six feet, she peered around the corner, sensing more than seeing that she was in the center aisle of about six rows of shelves. To her far right was a brick wall, and when she looked in the opposite direction, she saw another door. It wasn’t steel like the one she had entered through, but old and wooden.
Suddenly the muffled pops and bangs ceased and she heard a man begin to address a group. The meeting was starting.
Hurrying to the door and staying light on her feet, she kept her eyes locked on the door. She recognized the voice of the man who was speaking. It was Drake, but his voice was too faint, rising and falling with every sentence.
The doorknob looked rickety and loose in its socket, and the handywoman in her was itching to tighten its screws. She told herself the impulse was ridiculous, but when she turned the knob, easing the door inward a crack, she realized she should’ve gone with her gut.
The doorknob fell off into her palm as she turned it, nearly giving her a heart attack, but that was nothing compared to the pings of its screws hitting the concrete.
She winced, hoped no one had heard, and then pressed her face to the crack, spying through the one-inch gap with her left eye.
The angle was bad. She realized the room she was peering out of was located in the back right corner of the shooting range. At the front of the range were the shooters’ stations, each framed with a set of metal walls braced together with a narrow shelf—the place where each shooter would stand to aim down the range.
Beyond the stations, she could see a group of men and women. She counted roughly fifteen individuals, but couldn’t see Drake. He was blocked by one of the metal stations.
She needed to get closer, if for no other reason than to hear him better, but the idea of padding in front of the targets made her stomach twist with knots.
Instead, she widened the door a little more and strained to overhear the meeting.
“C & P has gone too far,” said Drake. “This is our town, and while they operate on the outskirts of it, rarely setting foot within it, yet controlling each and every one of us, they have been taking ninety percent of the profit, while we, every one of us in this room, shoulder ninety-nine percent of the risk. Enough is enough!”
The men and women cheered.
“The time is now,” he went on. “Their entire shipment is hidden in every nook and cranny in Rock Ridge. If we act now, if we seize the shipment, we can sell it ourselves. It will be our first attack in the war to usurp C & P.”
The group of men and women fell into silent consideration, and Kate could sense their rising tension. They were scared.
“To explain the ins and outs of this plan, I give you...Becky Langley.”
Kate gasped, but quickly slapped her hands over her mouth to muffle the sound. It had been her highest hope to find Becky Langley, but she hadn’t trusted that she would. She couldn’t believe her eyes as she watched Jason’s fiancée, the young woman who had been leading a double life until she disappeared, saunter confidently towards the group.
Becky had always been one to dress in feminine skirts and dresses. Kate used to regard her as a soft spoken girly-girl. But that was not the woman readying to address her followers. Becky looked tough. Dressed in biker gear—tight, black jeans and a gray tank top under a black leather vest—she clearly meant business. Kate spotted a holstered gun under Becky’s right arm. Her blond, wavy hair was slicked back into a high ponytail.
Kate realized she had stopped breathing, she was so eager to hear Becky speak. She widened the door and tilted her ear towards the room, enthralled.
“They know what we’re up to,” she announced, her sharp eyes scanning the group, making eye contact with each and every member. “They killed Grant for a reason, to send us a message. That message is that any one of us, no matter how high or low on the totem pole, can be killed if we step out of line.”
The voices began to murmur and Becky lifted her hand to silence them.
“But they still trust us. They have to. We represent the l
egs on this table, and without us, the whole organization will collapse. Drake’s correct. They aren’t in Rock Ridge, but their product is. Now is the time, the only time, we’ll have the opportunity to take back what’s rightfully ours.”
“How?” asked one of the men from the back of the group.
“We need one group to move the product to an undisclosed location. Then we’ll lure Colombia & Partners to it with promises of making a deal. Once we have them, all of them, we will surround them. And assassinate.”
There were gasps and fearful grumbling from the group, and again Becky raised her hand to quiet them.
“We have the firearms to pull this off,” she assured them.
“So do they,” one of the women countered.
Then another man asked, “What will the second group do?”
Becky locked eyes with him and stated, “Keep the order.”
Kate could tell by the murmuring that followed that Becky hadn’t made herself clear.
“Colombia & Partners was effective for so long because they knew how to keep Scott York distracted. I was tipping them off in that regard, as well. I got close to Scott by getting close to his stepson. Scott’s easy.” She paused for a beat, and Kate felt suddenly sick at what might follow. Her worst fears were confirmed when Becky said, “Scott’s wife, however, is not. I thought framing her son Jason would get her out of our hair.” Becky made a noise of frustration, balling her hands into fists. “But I’m not convinced it has. So the second group will move into Plan B.”
“I thought Plan B was the shoot-out,” voiced one of the women.
“It was,” Becky admitted. “But it was only phase one.”
“How many phases will there be?”
“As many as it takes to kill her.”
Kate thought she might faint. She felt light-headed and nauseous and furious. Her heart was racing and her pulse throbbed so loudly that she could hear the pounding in her ears. She told herself to run, get the hell out of the shooting range and drive away before anyone could spot her truck, but something inside her wouldn’t let her flee.
Mrs. Fix It Mysteries: The Complete 15-Books Cozy Mystery Series Page 89
