by K Carothers
They’d arrested Stella Givens as well, who’d continued to act as sweet as pie the whole time and hadn’t quite understood why she was going to jail, even after being confronted with the evidence from the flash drive.
It turned out she and Frank had created a secret bank account in the name of the city called a City Reserve Development Account, with Stella listed as the second account holder, giving her full access to the funds. Over the years millions of dollars from a real city money market account with an almost identical name were transferred into the fraudulent account. Then they’d created fake invoices from the state so the city auditors would believe the funds in the legitimate account were being used appropriately. They’d also made payments to what appeared to be real companies, but were actually just shell companies Frank had created. Too much power had clearly been put into one person’s hands—a mistake at any level of government. But Stella had been there so long, and was so highly regarded by everyone, that no one would have thought her capable of such duplicity.
Wayne Raabe should have joined the nefarious little group in jail, but he never made it. He’d started withdrawing from heroin in the hospital, and the symptoms eventually became so severe that he tried to bash his head in on one of the bed rails he’d been handcuffed to. Fortunately, he wasn’t as good at head-bashing as Erin was, and the doctor medically cleared him for transfer to a detox facility in Madison, where he would remain under continuous guard by sheriff’s deputies until he was released to take up residence with the others at the county jail.
Jeff Kilbride was another loose end they still needed to tie up. As far as anyone knew he hadn’t returned to town yet, and he wasn’t answering his phone. Sheriff Gaines had stopped by his house earlier in the evening, and his wife hadn’t been able to reach him either. Luke suspected he’d caught wind of everything and had gone into hiding. But it was something he would worry about tomorrow. Right now he just wanted to see Erin, and the thought immediately brought a smile to his face.
Just as he started to get up, though, his cell phone went off for about the fiftieth time in the last several hours, and he sat back down with a frustrated groan. News of the drug bust had quickly spread, and he’d been bombarded with one call after another since then. But when he checked his phone he saw the call was from Mike O’Hara, the city council president—and now the interim mayor as designated by the city charter. Luke had informed him of his new title last night after they’d formally arrested Frank.
He hit the talk button. “Hey, Mike.”
“Good evening, Luke. I don’t want to take up too much of your time. I know you’ve had a long day. But I just got off the phone with Sheriff Gaines, and I’ve got an urgent matter to discuss with you. Congratulations, by the way. I understand you played an important role in tracing the drugs back to a lab in Mexico. She said the DEA even offered you the opportunity to join them. That’s impressive.”
“Thanks, Mike,” Luke said, smiling wryly to himself. All he’d really done was find Ed’s burner phone. After the hazmat team had cleared the truck—emptying out enough drugs in various secret compartments that even the DEA agents were shocked—he’d inspected the interior himself, figuring if Ed hadn’t gotten rid of the phone yet it would be hidden somewhere he could easily reach it while driving. And it had taken him all of five minutes to find it.
Another secret compartment had been built behind the truck’s in-dash LCD touch screen, and was wired into the electrical system so that a sequence of buttons or switches already in the vehicle had to be pushed to lift the screen up and access the compartment, such as the power door lock button, the power window button, and so forth. The hard-core drug dealers were all using those kinds of compartments nowadays. But there was no way Luke could have guessed what the right sequence was. He just knew that particular spot was where they often put one of their secret compartments, so he’d smashed the whole thing in. The truck had become government property anyway. And sure enough, he’d found the phone, along with another gun, and a bunch of cash.
Unlocking the phone had been just as easy. He’d figured Ed probably used the same password as his regular cell phone, and that if his girlfriend suspected he’d been cheating on her, there was a good chance she knew it. And he’d been right on both accounts. The FBI and DEA had taken over from there, tracing a number on the phone back to a location in Mexico. They’d contacted the Mexican Federal Police, who’d quickly organized a raid, discovering millions of dollars’ worth of fentanyl, heroin, and other drugs. They figured it might be the biggest fentanyl bust they’d ever had in Mexico.
“Do you think you’ll take the DEA up on their offer?” Mike asked.
“I don’t think so,” Luke responded. “Those guys are on the road all the time, and I kind of like being home to cut my own lawn, watch football on Sunday, and kiss my girlfriend goodnight.” Not necessarily in that order, he thought with a grin.
“I’m glad to hear you say that,” Mike said. “I called an emergency meeting of the City Council earlier tonight. And based on the recommendation of Sheriff Gaines, I’d like to offer you the job as Chief of Police. The Council members unanimously agreed. This mess is going to be national news tomorrow, and we want someone in that position who will represent us well. It will also make you the youngest police chief in New Dublin history, by the way.”
Luke sat there in shock. “That’s quite an honor, Mike,” he said after a moment. “I appreciate the confidence you have in me.”
“I hope there’s not a ‘but’ coming next. We need your leadership, Luke. I tried to contact Jeff once Sheriff Gaines gave me the go ahead. He didn’t answer, and I left messages requesting he be at the meeting, but he never showed up. Have you heard from him?”
“No, not a word. Something is going on with him, but I don’t know what. I’m not even sure it has anything to do with the drug ring. Frank or Ed probably would’ve put the blame on him by now if he was involved. They’ve certainly spread enough of it around. But they haven’t mentioned him once, and his name isn’t on any of the files we recovered from Frank’s flash drive. But whatever’s going on with him, he’s not in the right frame of mind to lead the police force, that’s for sure.”
“So you’ll take the job?”
Luke paused in thought. It was his dream job, he realized…But he knew without a doubt he’d still choose Erin when the time came. It wouldn’t even be a hard decision. No title was worth more than love. Nothing was worth more than love. But he would have one hell of a thing to put on his resumé in Boston.
“I’ll act as the interim police chief,” he finally said. “And we’ll see what happens after the dust settles. Once an election is held the new mayor will probably want to pick someone else anyway.”
“We’ve got a lot of policies and procedures to revamp after this,” Mike told him. “And one of them is how the police chief is selected. We’ve already decided that the final decision will be made by the City Council from now on, so I can guarantee the job will be yours for as long as you want it. And I do hope that’s a long time. Congratulations, Luke. We’ll make the announcement tomorrow.”
* * *
Shortly after Luke left the police station, Jeff Kilbride walked in. He aimlessly wandered the halls for a while, then finally ended up in his office—though he knew it wouldn’t be his office for long.
He glanced at all the pictures on the walls, pictures he’d pretty much ignored for years now—his family, colleagues and friends, himself at various stages of his career…One picture in particular caught his eye. It was the one his parents had taken of him in his Army fatigues right before boot camp. He’d been so excited to start a new chapter in his life then. He was finally going to be somebody.
But the Army had never turned him into the man he’d hoped to become, and he’d spent the next forty years of his life wallowing in anonymity. Not even being named Police Chief had been enough to satisfy him. He’d
only gotten the job because of Frank anyway.
Tina had always made him feel important, though. She’d made him feel like a man. And he’d loved her for that. But she’d also brought out the dark side of him, the deep, dark, ugly side he’d always tried to keep hidden, and he’d eventually given in to lust, casting aside his friendship with Frank to have her. But he hadn’t meant to continue the affair for long. He’d certainly never intended for things to get so out of hand.
He was sure Frank didn’t know about his involvement with Tina. But like a pesky sliver stuck deep in the skin, the truth would work its way out eventually. It usually did. Mistakes were inevitable when it came to deception, and he and Tina had made too many of them. They hadn’t been careful enough—and not just with respect to the pregnancy she’d planned to abort. They’d spent way too much time together when they shouldn’t have. Tina had even stayed with him at the hotel for the police conference he’d just attended in Madison, telling Frank she was driving down to visit her sister in Illinois. Someone was bound to put two and two together eventually—if they hadn’t already. And with his DNA all over the crime scene, the evidence would be overwhelming and the outcome inevitable: He was going to end up in prison for Tina’s murder. It was only a matter of time. And his wife would never forgive him. His sons would hate him. He would die in anonymity. Alone. Poetic justice would be served.
He figured Frank had probably found out that Tina was cheating on him with someone—more than likely because of the pregnancy—and then put a hit out on her. His friend would never have gotten his own hands that dirty. And he wondered if the killer had been lurking somewhere in the shadows while he’d still been there with Tina himself that night—and Frank had conveniently been at City Hall.
But Jeff bore him no ill will. Frank had always been good to him. It was his own fault that all this had happened. He was the one who’d betrayed their friendship. He was ultimately responsible for Tina’s death. And he could think of only one way out of the mess he’d made.
He sat down in the brown leather chair behind his desk and slid his pant leg up, pulling his Glock from the leg holster he was wearing. Then he leaned back and ran his fingers slowly over the smooth, hard surface of the barrel. And while he stared at it he thought about God for the first time in a very long time, and wished that He really did exist, that there was a greater force he could turn to at a time like this. He might have hope then—hope that he could get through this mess somehow, that he could get through everything life dealt him. There would be a deeper meaning, a higher purpose to his life if God existed, and maybe then he wouldn’t feel so dissatisfied, so empty all the time—an emptiness that nothing else had ever been able to fill.
But he’d seen too much in his thirty-six years as a cop. He knew God couldn’t possibly exist.
With that thought in mind he quickly scribbled a note. And without hesitation, he lifted the gun to his head and pulled the trigger.
The world went dark for an instant. And then he woke up. He felt himself separate from his flesh and float upward, weightless. He gazed down at the motionless body slumped over in the chair below him and knew it was his body…But somehow he was still there. He could still see, and hear, and think.
As the wonder of it dawned on him he saw a light—the light he’d joked about so many times in his life. It grew and was like nothing he’d ever seen before—an incredibly bright, shimmering light. It was almost as if the light itself was alive…
He headed toward it, irresistibly drawn in by some unknown, magnetic force, though he wasn’t afraid.
And a moment later he learned how much more there really was.
Chapter
23
“You have powdered sugar on your face,” Erin told Jenna.
“Where?” she asked, wiping her mouth.
“Right here.” With a grin Erin dipped her finger into the bowl of powdered sugar on the kitchen counter and dotted her friend’s nose with it.
Jenna laughed, then reached into the bowl and flicked some back at Erin. “You have more.”
Erin returned the favor. “No, you have more.”
It was open season after that. In a fit of giggles they soon had powdered sugar everywhere.
“What in God’s name are the two of you doing?”
They both abruptly stopped laughing and turned to see Luke leaning against the kitchen doorway, shaking his head in bemusement.
Erin brushed some of the powder off her face with a sheepish smile. “We decided to try our hand at making donuts. But we found out it’s a lot easier to buy them.”
“Don’t move,” Luke said when she reached for a kitchen towel. “I want to take a picture of this.” And with a chuckle he pulled his phone out.
“No, Luke,” Erin protested. “Please don’t take a picture.”
“Come on, just one.” He aimed the phone at them. “Now put a smile on your pretty, powdered sugar-coated faces for the camera.”
“Luke, I take horrible pictures, really,” Erin said. “Don’t you remember what happened in seventh grade? I had that awful grimace on my face for the school pictures, and they never retook them. I was the laughing stock of our class all year.”
“I forgot about that,” Jenna said with a grimace of her own. “I felt so bad for you. And then you refused to have any school pictures taken again after that.”
Erin hastily brushed off the powered sugar, glancing at Luke. “See. Me and the camera do not get along.”
Luke grinned. “Too late. I already got a picture.”
Erin winced. “And I probably look like I’m sucking on a lemon.”
“No, it looks like a bag of powdered sugar blew up in your face.” Luke came over and planted a quick kiss on her lips. “But you taste even sweeter.” Then he grabbed a donut off the plate on the counter and took a healthy bite, giving her a devilish grin afterward. “These are really good. But I hope it doesn’t mean handcuffs are off the table.”
Erin laughed at the remark, though a helpless blush still crept over her cheeks.
“Ah, I think I’ll go grab the broom,” Jenna said.
“Oh, don’t play innocent with me, Miss Godfrey,” Luke teased. “Erin confessed it was you who gave her the advice about how desperate times call for desperate measures.”
A guilty smile crossed Jenna’s face. “Okay, I confess that may not have been the best advice I’ve ever given.”
“Well, who would have guessed that communication actually works?” Luke said dryly, and polished off the rest of the donut.
“Let’s change the subject, please,” Erin told him. “I’ll go get the broom. And then you need to tell us how you caught Ed Finks.”
Luke chuckled. “Bandit is actually the one who caught him. He tore up Ed’s arm pretty good in the process, and we had to take him to the ER. Your old boyfriend Chase stitched him up.”
Erin rolled her eyes. “Chase is not my old boyfriend. And if you say that again, you’ll be the next one in handcuffs.”
Luke gave her another devilish grin. “Your old boyfriend asked if you were the one who bit Ed.”
Jenna choked back a laugh, and Erin shook her head at them both and went to get the broom. When she returned, Luke told them about Ed’s capture from the beginning—while he stood by the counter pigging out on another donut.
“My God, Luke,” Erin said in dismay after he finished the story. “If Ed had gotten into the woods, he probably would have started shooting at you.”
“Probably. But I had my safety gear on. I knew it might get ugly. I just hadn’t expected it would get that ugly.” He grinned at Jenna, who’d gone to sit at the kitchen table. “I guess he learned the whole desperate times, desperate measures thing too.”
She laughed ruefully in response. “You’re never going to let me forget about that, are you?”
“I’m never going to let eith
er one of you forget about it,” he said, pulling the milk container out of the refrigerator and pouring himself a glass. Then he grabbed a third donut and sat down across from her.
Erin leaned the broom against the wall and joined them. “So if Ed was in Mexico, do you think the mayor is the one who killed Tina?”
“Frank is the ex-mayor now,” Luke told her. “Mike O’Hara, the president of the city council, took over. But it’s possible he hired someone to do it. Frank has been feeding us so many lies I doubt even he knows what the truth is anymore.”
“Truth is lighter than air and best friends with the wind,” Jenna remarked. “One of the many reasons I don’t envy you your job.”
“I don’t think many people do,” Luke said. “But in any case, Tina was pregnant, and it wasn’t Frank’s. The father’s DNA was all over the crime scene, including under her fingernails, so chances are he was the one who murdered her. But right now we have no idea who he is.”
Jenna’s eyes widened in disbelief. “Good Lord! This whole thing just keeps getting uglier, doesn’t it?”
Luke smiled grimly. “Yeah, and I haven’t even told you everything. We arrested Stella Givens today, too.”
“Stella!?” Jenna exclaimed in shock. “You must have made a mistake, Luke.”
"I wish I had," he said. Then he recounted the laundry list of crimes she and Frank had committed.
“I just can’t believe it,” Jenna whispered. “Stella…”
Luke nodded, taking a big bite of his donut. “Yep. Sweet-as-pie Stella Givens.”
“Why on earth would she do those things?” Jenna asked, flabbergasted. “My God, she’s been on the parish council at church for as long as I can remember.”
“At least she wasn’t on the finance council,” Luke said, tongue-in-cheek. “But the answer to your question is greed, Jenna. Pure and simple greed. And Jeff Kilbride, the police chief, might be involved in some way as well. Mike O’Hara was going to ask him to step down today, but we think he may have gone on the run. Mike asked me to fill in as chief until all this gets sorted out.”
