by J A Whiting
Jenna used the two screwdrivers to work the door in between where Dave and Angie’s tools were positioned.
It must have been over a hundred degrees in the shed and sweat poured off the three people from the combination of fear and the high temperature.
“It’s moving.” Dave’s voice was triumphant. “It’s giving way. Keep at it.”
Angie could see the space was wider now. Where was Chief Martin?
“I think it’s loose enough,” Jenna told them. “Let’s use our weight and try to break the door off.”
Angie, Dave, and Jenna lined up side by side with their shoulders facing the door.
“On three,” Angie said softly, and then she began to count.
When she got to two, the rectangular box near their feet clicked once, loudly. All three of them knew what would happen next.
“Now!” Angie shouted and they slammed their shoulders against the door with such force that the hinges bent and the door opened halfway. “Run!”
Jenna was the first one out and she ran a few yards and turned around. “Come on, Angie!”
Angie was next, running as fast as she could, with Dave at her heels. She grabbed her sister’s outstretched hand, and they all took off.
Two seconds later, a deathly sound engulfed them, a blast of burning light flashed, and the shed exploded sending all three of them hurtling into the air and then smashing to the ground.
Debris rained down on them as Chief Martin ran into the yard.
“It’s a good thing it was an old shed,” Angie said to Jenna.
The sisters were sitting on a hospital bed in the emergency room being treated for cuts and bruises.
“You can say that again.” Jenna watched the doctor stitch up a slice on her arm. “We cut it kind of close.”
“Yeah.” Angie gently rested her hand on her abdomen. “But, it didn’t matter. We got out.”
Chief Martin peeked his head into the room. “Can I come in?” He looked a little paler than usual. “Everyone still okay?”
Angie smiled. “We’re all fine. All four of us. Although, two of us will be sore for a few days.”
When the bomb went off, the shed was blown up, but thankfully, the angle of the explosion sent most of the wood and nails up and back, away from the escapees. Their injuries were mainly the result of hurtling to the ground.
The babies, though, were perfectly healthy and completely unharmed.
Dave Hanes suffered a broken arm and some cuts, and while he was getting a cast put on, he regaled the nurses and doctors with his tale of his quick-witted escape.
Chief Martin arrived just as the bomb went off and nearly had a heart attack when he saw Angie and Jenna on the ground, bleeding and stunned. Once he saw they were alive, a few tears of joy and relief may have spilled, but he would deny it, if it was ever brought up by anyone.
Within minutes, ambulances, two detectives, police officers, and fire trucks all descended on Dave’s house and sprang into action. Joe Boles was found a few miles away and was taken into custody.
Together, Josh and Tom burst into the emergency room while the twin sisters were still on stretchers and when they saw their wives alive and talking, they wrapped the women in their arms.
Shortly after the men arrived, Ellie, Courtney, and Mr. Finch rushed in, and once they saw the sisters with only minor injuries, they were filled with relief and happiness … and then the teasing and joking started.
“Why do you two have all the excitement?” Courtney smiled. “Couldn’t you have brought the rest of us along to get locked in a shed?”
“Miss Ellie might have been able to use her telekinesis skills to bring you a saw,” Mr. Finch kidded with them.
Ellie said with a sigh, “I worried you two were in danger. The cats started acting crazy, howling and dashing around the house like maniacs. I called Chief Martin, but he was in a meeting. When he called me back, I was already in the van heading to Dave Hanes’s house.”
Angie cocked her head to the side and her eyes were soft. “You did? You were coming to check on us?”
“The chief told me to pull over and wait where I was. He was almost to the house.”
“I didn’t want her walking into trouble,” the chief said. “I put the siren on and sped to the house. Unfortunately, a little too late to be of help.”
“Chief Martin finally called me and told me you were both okay, but were on the way to the hospital to be checked over. I picked up Courtney and Mr. Finch and we got here as fast as we could.” Ellie passed her hand over her eyes. “I can’t take much more of this. Please just stay in the house for the rest of your lives.”
Courtney slipped her arm around her sister’s shoulders and kidded, “My skills must be expanding because I can see the future … I can see there’s no way that’s going to happen, sis.”
26
The tables behind Mr. Finch’s house were laden with all kinds of food, salads of every variety, rice, cut-up fruit, small quiches, pizza rolls, stuffed mushrooms, mini spanakopita, and crackers with ricotta cheese and sliced strawberries. Coolers of cold drinks stood by the tables.
Some of the men were clustered around the grills cooking sausages, veggie burgers, teriyaki chicken kabobs, and garlic shrimp.
Jack, Rufus, Chief Martin, and Mel were playing a game of horseshoes while Lucille, Francine, Mr. Finch, Betty, Ellie, and Jack showed their skill at badminton.
“Oh, my.” Betty fanned her face with her hand. “I haven’t moved this much in thirty years.”
Jenna, Angie, Orla, and Francine’s new boyfriend, Bill, were deep into a rousing game of corn hole. Angie groaned when her bag of corn missed the hole and sailed over the platform onto the grass.
Euclid and Circe sat on the Adirondack chairs watching the humans play their games.
Joe Boles was arrested for attempted murder, malicious destruction of property resulting in personal injury, possession of a firearm in relation to a crime of violence, interstate transportation of an explosive, and numerous other charges.
Joe was the man at the hospital who harassed and threatened Carol Leeds. He was the man in the restaurant parking lot who argued and threatened Jesse and Mary Foley. He bore a grudge against Agnes Shield because she wouldn’t take his abuse when he yelled and swore at her for getting in the painters’ way on the street outside her home and he was infuriated with the Reynolds because they complained about him to his boss.
Joe had it in for Dave Hanes for fighting with him and getting them fired from Blue Sky Painting. Having a certain knack for twisting an event so that, in his mind, he was never to blame for any negative result, Joe believed the people he targeted should be punished for causing him so much distress. Nothing was ever Joe’s fault, and was never the result of his own bad behavior.
He delivered the package bombs to Agnes’s front porch and to Dennis Leeds’s mailbox dressed as a delivery person, ever careful to wear sunglasses, a hat, and to dress in dark-colored chinos and a polo shirt to mimic a company deliveryman.
Joe wore a t-shirt with the Blue Sky Painting logo and company name on it when he got into the altercation with Jesse and Mary. The run-in with the young couple was the reason he made a bomb for them which was set to go off when the car engine started.
He was especially proud of his bomb-in-the-log idea which injured Mrs. Reynolds and her teenaged daughter.
Law enforcement discovered a dozen other bombs in Joe’s basement along with a list of names of planned targeted victims that included Solana Police Chief Peterson, Chief Martin, the owner of Blue Sky Painting, and Dave Hanes.
Chief Peterson worked with the media to alert people who had ever had an altercation with Joe Boles to be vigilant about their safety and to call the police if they found anything on their property that might be cause for concern. The police believed that Joe might have bombs already delivered to unsuspecting victims.
Dave Hanes didn’t lie about seeing the car at Dennis Leeds’s house on the day the bomb was put in the mailbox. J
oe Boles owned that car and used it to deliver the package bomb.
When the grilled food was placed on large platters and set on some of the tables, the friends gathered around to serve themselves buffet style and then carried their dinner plates to sit at the picnic tables together. Euclid and Circe were given small plates of plain chicken to eat and both of them were happily chewing away at their feast.
“This was a great idea, Mr. Finch.” Angie lifted her fork of greens to her mouth.
“We needed a celebration,” Finch said. “Orla and Mel are going to buy my house and Tom will be starting soon on the construction of the Victorian’s apartment addition.” He glanced at Angie and Jenna with soft, kind eyes. “And all of us are safe and well.”
“How is that poor Dave Hanes doing?” Betty piled her plate high with rice, salad, and two chicken kabobs.
Chief Martin answered, “Dave is doing well. His arm is healing and he’s making plans to rebuild the shed, but this time he’ll include windows on three sides in case he ever needs to make another escape from the structure. With some prodding and encouragement, he also paid a visit to his former boss at Blue Sky to make a case for getting his job back. The boss has agreed to hire him, but Dave must complete a month on probation. If he can make it through the month trouble free, then he will become a permanent employee once again.”
“I’m glad for him,” Courtney said. “He seems like a decent guy who was tormented at work by a monster. I’m happy he’s getting a second chance.”
After the meal, a fire was lit in Mr. Finch’s portable fire pit and everyone enjoyed dessert and mingled with one another around the yard.
“Your drawings were trying to tell us something all along.” Angie kept her voice down.
“If we’d only realized earlier what the pictures were trying to convey to us,” Finch said, “things may have been resolved quicker.”
“You can’t push.” Orla joined Angie, Finch, Ellie, Courtney, and Jenna. “You can only interpret the messages we receive whether they are sent visually, orally, or mentally. Information comes in its own way and in its own time. We are merely the receptacles and the receivers.”
“It’s the interpretation part that’s the hardest,” Courtney told the woman. “We gather the messages just fine … usually … but it’s figuring them out that gives us a pain.”
“We were slow to pick up on the clues in the drawings,” Angie explained.
“Things will get easier as time passes and you gain more experience.” Orla gave them all a nod. “How are the mothers-to-be and their babies doing?”
“Good,” Jenna smiled. “Angie and I are both past the morning sickness and are doing really well.”
“We haven’t felt the little ones move yet, but the doctor says it’s too early.” Angie rubbed at her belly.
“Soon though.” Orla nodded. “I know the name you’ve chosen,” the woman told Angie and then looked to Jenna. “Do you and Tom have names picked out?”
“We’re working on it.” Jenna didn’t want to share any possible names just yet. “We haven’t found out if it’s a boy or a girl, and Tom and I have decided to wait until he or she is born to find out.”
“It will be a lovely surprise,” Orla said.
Tom and Josh came over to join the group and the discussion moved from the future additions to the family and furnishing the nurseries, to the weather, the coming end of summer, how their businesses were doing, and the fall festival.
“I’m on the fall festival committee representing the finance board,” Ellie told them. “We’ve already begun our meetings.”
“Time flies,” Mr. Finch said. “The leaves will be turning colors soon.”
Some of the friends decided to return to the games, leaving Jenna, Angie, Orla, and the cats sitting together in the lawn chairs. Euclid rested across Angie’s lap, his eyes closing off and on, and Circe had curled up next to Jenna, purring.
“What sweet animals,” Orla said, and then added pointedly, “they’re very smart, aren’t they?”
Angie smiled. “Sometimes, I think they’re more than smart.”
“Hmm. I wondered about that. They’re both very perceptive.”
Euclid lifted his head and trilled at Orla.
“Too bad they can’t talk,” Jenna said.
“Actually, that’s probably a good thing,” Angie let out a laugh, and then she turned serious. “Jenna and I were talking about our mother recently.”
“Oh?” Orla tilted her head slightly to the side.
“She died in Boston. It was a hit and run. Did you know that?”
“I heard about it, yes. I didn’t know your mother. I’m sorry that happened to her.”
Angie made eye contact with Jenna, and then said, “We were wondering about the accident. It was a clear day on a fairly quiet side street. Why didn’t the person slow down when he or she saw Mom crossing?”
“The person must have been distracted,” Orla said.
Angie leaned closer. “Do you know anything about what happened that day? Or why it happened?”
Mel’s voice boomed across the yard. “Orla, come here and help me. I’m losing this game. I need you.”
Orla gave Mel a wave. “I’d better get over there. You know how competitive Mel is.”
Angie was about to say something, when Orla looked into her eyes. “We’ll have a talk someday soon.”
When the woman was out of earshot, Jenna said, “She knows something.”
“Yeah. I wonder when she’ll tell us.”
“Orla said earlier that these things can’t be pushed. We’ll find out what happened to Mom when the time is right. But for now, I’m going to sit here in Mr. Finch’s yard on this beautiful summer evening watching our family and friends … with two fine felines and my sister right beside me.” Jenna reached for Angie’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “And think about how lucky we are.”
Thank you for reading! Recipes below!
Books by J.A. WHITING can be found here:
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Also by J. A. Whiting
OLIVIA MILLER MYSTERIES (not cozy)
SWEET COVE COZY MYSTERIES
LIN COFFIN COZY MYSTERIES
CLAIRE ROLLINS COZY MYSTERIES
PAXTON PARK COZY MYSTERIES
SEEING COLORS MYSTERIES
About the Author
J.A. Whiting lives with her family in New England. Whiting loves reading and writing mystery stories.
Visit me at:
www.jawhiting.com
www.bookbub.com/authors/j-a-whiting
www.amazon.com/author/jawhiting
www.facebook.com/jawhitingauthor
Some Recipes From The Sweet Cove Series
Fruit and Custard Pie
INGREDIENTS
A little butter to grease the pan
Confectioner’s sugar to sprinkle over the pie
2 – 2¼ cups of fruit of your choice – blueberries, raspberries, or seedless red grapes, cherries, blackberries, cranberries
3 eggs
⅓ cup sugar and ¼ cup sugar
⅛ teaspoon of salt
1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
¼ cup heavy cream
1 cup milk
¾ cup flour
DIRECTIONS
Set oven to 375°F.
Butter a 10" baking dish or a pie plate.
Arrange the fruit in the dish.
Using a blender, blend at high speed to combine eggs, ⅓ cup sugar, salt, vanilla, cream, and milk.
Add the flour – blend until smooth.
Pour enough of the mixture to just cover the fruit.
Sprinkle ¼ cup sugar
over the batter.
Pour in the rest of the batter and smooth with the back of a spoon.
Bake for about 35 minutes or until the top is puffy and golden, and a toothpick tests the center and comes out clean.
Cool on a wire rack.
Sprinkle with confectioner’s sugar.
Apple Cake
INGREDIENTS
1 stick butter, room temperature
¾ cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1¼ cups of all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Pinch of salt
2 medium-size apples (peeled, cored, and cut into small cubes – can use Honey crisp, Granny Smith, Fuji, or Gala apples or combine two kinds together)
DIRECTIONS
Set the oven to 350°F.
Spray a 9" round cake pan or spring form pan with baking spray; or grease the pan with butter.
NOTE: If not using a spring form pan, it will help to line the pan with parchment paper and grease the top of the paper.
In a large bowl, beat butter and sugar with an electric mixer set on medium speed until fluffy.
Beat in the eggs one at a time.
Mix in the vanilla, flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt using low speed until combined.
Using a rubber spatula, stir the apples into the batter.
Pour/spoon the batter into the pan.
Bake for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Cool on a rack for 10 minutes, then remove the cake from the pan to a metal rack and let cool for 10-15 minutes more.
Sprinkle the top with confectioner’s sugar.
