BATTERED BLUFF

by Beck, Jessica

  “As much as I appreciate the sentiment, we both know that’s not going to happen,” Killian said. “You’ve stood by me for years, and you should be rewarded for your loyalty.”

  “I don’t know what to say,” Hank stammered.

  “That’s a first then, isn’t it?” Killian asked him with a slight grin.

  “Wow. Just wow,” Hank said as Jasper started to stir. The moment he regained his senses, he said, “You struck me! Uncle K. I demand that you fire that brute!”

  “That’s going to be kind of hard to do, since I just made him my sole heir,” Killian said. “If you want to dispute it, then Hank will see you in court, I’m sure. Jake, Suzanne, and Vera will all testify that I did it of my own free will.”

  “Of sound mind, I’m not so sure about,” Vera said.

  “Watch your step,” Killian told her.

  “You know what? I don’t think I will.” She turned to Jasper and added, “If you want to fight him in court, I’ll back you up that he wasn’t thinking straight when he did this. I’ve got enough money to pay for the best lawyers that money can buy.”

  Jasper didn’t immediately jump on the offer. “What’s in it for you? I can’t imagine that you’re doing it out of the goodness of your heart.”

  “It’s simple enough. After we win, I get half,” Vera said.

  “That’s insane,” Jasper replied.

  “Think about it. Which would you rather have, all of nothing or half of more than you’ll ever be able to spend in your life?” Vera asked him.

  “As much as I enjoy hearing you two plot to overturn my will, Jake wasn’t finished when Jasper interrupted. I trust that won’t happen again,” Killian asked his nephew.

  Jasper was about to reply when he looked up to see Hank moving closer to him. “I’ll be quiet, at least for the moment,” he said.

  “I’m sure that’s the best we can hope for,” Killian said. “Go on, Jake. You’ve got the floor. Did he kill Abel, too?”

  “I don’t think so,” Jake explained. “He didn’t have a motive, unless Abel caught him as he was getting rid of Beatrice’s body. If that had happened, he wouldn’t have been able to plan such an intricate attack that wasn’t time sensitive. No, whoever killed Abel has known him for quite a while.”

  “Well, I certainly had no reason to want to see him dead,” Killian said.

  “I’ve known him for years myself,” Hank said, “but the two of us got along just fine.”

  “Just say it. I know you’re all thinking it,” Vera said.

  “You had motive, any one of us had the means, but you had the most opportunity,” I said, stepping in. “You had a meeting with Abel that didn’t go very well recently, did it?”

  “Are you talking about that nonsense out on the balcony earlier?” she asked. “So we had an argument. Big deal.”

  “No, I’m talking about you blackmailing him to get him to take your side against Killian earlier,” I said.

  “How could you possibly know about that?” Vera snapped.

  “I read his appointment book,” I said. “Did you realize that he made notes after every meeting he had? It must have just started recently, and I have to wonder if his mind wasn’t slipping a little.”

  “It was,” Killian said. “He was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s, and he didn’t want anyone else to know.”

  “So that’s why he fought me about forcing you back into the business,” Vera said. “Suddenly it’s all starting to make sense.”

  “If you’d known, would you have still switched his meds on him?” I asked her.

  “I didn’t kill anybody,” Vera insisted.

  “So you say,” Jasper answered.

  “Shut up, killer,” she told him.

  He started to get up again when Hank got there quicker than I could have imagined. “Stay right where you are, Sparky.”

  “Why are you calling me that?” Jasper asked.

  “They use the electric chair in this state, don’t they?” Hank asked.

  “Not anymore,” Jake said. “Now it’s lethal injection.”

  “I didn’t kill anybody!” he shouted, and despite Hank’s earlier threat, he started to stand again.

  With one hand on his chest, Hank had him back in his seat with a great deal more force than I thought was entirely necessary, not that I blamed him for doing it.

  “I didn’t do it,” Jasper said petulantly.

  “So you say,” Hank answered. “So what do we do now, lock these two up in one of the rooms downstairs until the cops come tomorrow?”

  “You can’t do that,” Vera snapped as she started to get up herself.

  “Just because I’ve never hit a woman doesn’t mean that I won’t,” Hank warned her. “You need to behave yourself.”

  “I don’t think so,” Vera said as she pulled the gun from her robe that had supposedly been upstairs under her pillow. I couldn’t believe that Jake and I hadn’t searched her the moment we’d heard that she had a weapon, but in our defense, a great deal had happened in a short amount of time.

  I just hoped we didn’t end up paying for it with our lives.

  Chapter 19

  “TAKE IT EASY, VERA,” Jake said calmly. “There’s no need for this.”

  “You’re not locking me up like some kind of animal!” she shouted as she started toward the front door. “You shouldn’t have pushed me!”

  “I’m sure you had your reasons to do what you did,” I said calmly. “After all, Abel threatened you yesterday. Jake and I saw it. There were extenuating circumstances.”

  “I didn’t do it!” she shouted at me, pointing the gun at my heart as she said it. “How many times do I have to tell you that?”

  “Give us the gun and we’ll discuss it,” Killian said as he started to take a step toward her.

  “Take one more step and you’ll be dead before your goons can get to me,” she said as the gun swung back at him. I knew that Killian could act rashly based on what had happened when he’d rushed his daughter’s attacker, and I doubted that Jake could draw his weapon fast enough to stop her.

  He tried, though.

  She was faster than I expected as she swung back on Jake. “If you finish drawing that gun, you’re a dead man. I may act sophisticated, but I grew up on a farm, and my daddy made sure I could shoot just about as soon as I could walk.”

  Jake’s hand dropped away, and I let a deep breath out. It was clear from the way Vera handled her weapon that she was no stranger to firearms, and besides, she had a head start on my husband.

  Then Vera did something that surprised me.

  She pointed her weapon at me again.

  “Now do us all a favor and take that gun of yours out nice and easy,” Vera said without looking at Jake. “If you try to get a shot off, your wife is dead.”

  “Jake, do what you have to do,” I said firmly. “You have my blessing. No matter what happens, I love you.”

  I saw him hesitate for a second, and then he did as Vera ordered. “I love you, too,” he said as he dropped his gun on the chair.

  “Suzanne, pick it up and bring it to me,” Vera commanded.

  I was two steps away from it when she barked out, “No! I changed my mind. Sit back down. It would be just my luck that he taught you to shoot.”

  Jake had given me a few lessons, and I had been contemplating taking a run at her just as she’d suspected that I might. Wow, this woman was extremely good at reading people, because she’d just nailed me as though she could hear my thoughts.

  “Jasper, grab it with two fingers and bring it here,” she said as she looked at the man with scorn.

  “I detest guns,” Jasper said. “I don’t want to touch that thing.”

  “That’s why you’re perfect for the job,” she said. “Don’t try to get heroic either, or you’ll be joining your sister upstairs.”

  Jasper did as he was told, and as he carried the gun toward Vera, he said, “I still don’t know why you had to kill her. Did she see yo
u kill Abel or something?”

  Vera’s face got red, and I saw her hand squeeze the grip tighter. “What do I have to do to convince you people that I didn’t kill anybody?”

  “You could start by putting that gun down,” Jake told her.

  “There is no chance of that happening, sport,” Vera said. “If I do that, I lose all of the power, and with the five of you against me, I don’t stand a chance.”

  “If you didn’t do it, then you don’t have anything to worry about,” I told her.

  “Yeah, how many people in prison believed that line at one point in their lives?”

  Vera started for the door when I called out, “You’re not going outside, are you? It’s treacherous out there.”

  “Maybe so, but it’s safer than being in here with you all.” She grabbed Hank’s jacket, which happened to be on a hook by the door. “If anybody follows me, they’re as good as dead.”

  A second later Vera slammed the door behind her, and she was gone.

  “What should we do?” Jasper asked. “We can’t just let her get away.”

  “Where is she going to go?” Hank asked him. “We’re safe enough from her while she’s out there and we’re in here.”

  Killian grabbed his coat. “We can’t let her just die outside alone. I need to talk some sense into her. I’ve lost too many people in the last twelve hours, and I’m not going to lose another one.”

  “Whatever you say, Boss, but if you go, then I’m going with you.”

  “Sorry, but we need to split up into pairs,” Killian said. “You and I know this mountaintop, but the two of them don’t. Jake, Suzanne, is that okay with you?”

  “I don’t like it, but we don’t have much choice,” Jake answered as he looked at me for my approval.

  “It makes sense,” I said. “I just wish we weren’t going out there unarmed.”

  “We won’t be,” Hank said. “Boss, I’m going to get some of our protection out of the safe. Is that okay with you?”

  “We don’t have much choice, do we?” Killian asked. “I don’t want anybody to shoot her unless there’s no other way to handle the situation, though. Agreed?”

  Everyone nodded, and Hank returned a minute later with two guns. “I’m sorry I don’t have one for everybody,” he said as he tucked one in his pocket and started to hand the other one to Killian. “Here you go, Boss.”

  “Give it to Jake,” Killian said. “He’s better with it than I would be.”

  “Whatever you say,” Hank said as he did as he was told. “Take care of him, even if it means shooting her. Do you understand?” he asked before he would release the weapon into Jake’s hands.

  “I know what I’m doing,” he said, and somehow Jake managed to wrestle the gun from Hank’s grip despite him holding onto it tightly. Hank was tough, but he looked it. Jake was also strong, but that could be deceptive, especially compared to the big man.

  “Then let’s go after her,” Hank said after I’d given everyone lit candles.

  “Suzanne, stay close to him,” Jake told me on our way out.

  “Be careful out there,” I said.

  “Right back at you,” he replied with a smile.

  “You need a coat, too,” Killian told his handyman.

  “I’ve got one I keep on a hook outside by the door. It was wet earlier so I didn’t want to mess up the floors in here.”

  “It’s going to be freezing cold to put on,” I warned him.

  He grinned at me. “I’m a big boy. I reckon I can take it.”

  “Let’s go, then.” I’d completely forgotten about Jasper until I started out. “Feel free to come with us,” I told him.

  “No thank you,” Jasper said. “I don’t see the point of getting shot trying to save someone who’s already killed two people.”

  “Suit yourself,” Jake said. “Why don’t you lock the door when we leave? You don’t want her circling back on you, do you?”

  “I most certainly do not,” Jasper said.

  Hank waited until Jasper got close to him. “If we have to knock twice, I’m not going to be happy with you. Do we understand each other?”

  “We do,” Jasper said shakily.

  I had a feeling he’d be sitting with his back to the door the second we left. Hank had clearly made an impression on him earlier.

  “The fog has gotten worse, hasn’t it?” I asked Hank as we headed off in a direction opposite of Killian and Jake.

  “Don’t worry. I know my way around this mountaintop like the back of my hand,” Hank said. “I still don’t know why we’re all risking our lives to save someone who doesn’t deserve it.”

  “Do you really think she killed Beatrice and Abel?” I asked him as we moved in the eerie calmness of the swirling clouds of white.

  “It kind of makes sense in a twisted sort of way,” Hank said as he peered into the nothingness. “Like you said, Abel and Vera didn’t really get along. Whether she killed Beatrice too or Jasper did it, I couldn’t tell you. I hate to say it, but as far as I’m concerned, good riddance. They were both making Killian’s life miserable, so I can’t say that I’ll be shedding a tear for either one of them.”

  It was a harsh thing to say, and I could hear a hint of anger in his voice that I’d caught a few times before when it came to my fellow guests. “You care a great deal about him, don’t you?”

  “I’d give my life for him,” Hank said.

  “It’s admirable of you, but why exactly are you so loyal to the man?” I asked him, curious what could inspire that much devotion to someone else.

  “It’s no real secret. I did something stupid when I was younger, and if it weren’t for Killian getting me out of it, I’d still be rotting away in prison,” Hank said. “But that’s old news.”

  “Really? I haven’t heard the story,” I said.

  “There’s not much to tell. I got a little drunk, and a guy pushed me in a bar. I didn’t mean to hit him as hard as I did. The judge was a third cousin of his or something, and he was ready to throw the book at me when Killian stepped in. I was working for him as a bagger at his first grocery store, and we got along pretty good. He paid for a decent lawyer, and with the judge knowing that he was being watched, I got off with serving five years instead of life. When I got out, he gave me my old job back, no questions asked.”

  “I can see why you’d be loyal to him after that,” I said.

  “That’s more than I can say for the rest of them,” he said as he took another step forward.

  Something in Abel’s appointment book clicked just then. “Were you here when Abel came to see Killian earlier in the week?”

  “I was around,” Hank said a bit invasively.

  “Where were you when Killian and Beatrice were arguing last night?” I asked him, the pieces suddenly coming together. Just because I hadn’t seen him didn’t mean that he hadn’t been somewhere nearby taking it all in.

  “I was around someplace. After all, I had a lot on my plate with you folks being here,” Hank said as he turned to look at me suddenly. I saw a flare of his temper just then, and I realized that beneath that calm and jovial surface he liked to project was still a very angry man.

  “Still, you must have heard them. I’m guessing from what you said earlier that you were with Killian when he got the news about his daughter, too.” I started lagging back a bit, trying to figure out some kind of way to get away from a man I was beginning to suspect was the real killer after all.

  “It nearly killed him, and I’m still not sure that it won’t. If one more of those ingrates pushes him even just a little bit more, he’s not going to survive it.”

  “Is that why you killed them, Hank? Were you trying to protect your boss?” I asked him.

  “What are you talking about?” Hank asked as he turned again to look at me.

  I saw that the gun was now pointing straight at me.

  I couldn’t stop myself, though. “You heard him fighting with Abel when he was here earlier, something that mus
t have greatly upset both men. I’m betting you saw Abel take a pill for his heart and you decided to kill him before you even knew about Leandra’s death. I’m guessing that you said something to Beatrice about backing off too, and she took offense. It doesn’t take a great leap of faith to figure out that you hit her and then threw her over the balcony.”

  “You think you’re smart, don’t you?” Hank asked me with the anger seething to the top now. “I couldn’t let them kill him! I did the world a favor getting rid of them both.”

  “Was that your plan, to knock us all off one by one?” I asked him, searching for somewhere, anywhere, I could hide, but Hank was too close to me to just dart off into the fog.

  “You and Jake were safe enough,” he said, “but yeah, Jasper and Vera were going to have ‘accidents’ of their own. When Killian’s grip slipped before, I thought he would take care of that one for me, but your husband had to butt in and save him. Never mind. I’ll figure something out before we get off this mountain.”

  “And one day, you’ll be richer than anybody you’ve ever known,” I told him, getting ready to throw my candle down and run despite the poor odds in my favor.

  “I didn’t do it for the money!” Hank shouted, and I saw him raise the gun a bit to get a shot off at me.

  Instead, there was another shot, just about close enough to us for me to feel the wind coming off the bullet.

  “Jake!” I shouted.

  “As a matter of fact, it’s Vera,” she said as Hank whirled around to return her fire. “That was your only warning.”

  I couldn’t let Hank shoot her when she’d just tried to save me.

  I jumped on his back to try to knock the gun out of his hand, but he threw me off as though I were a rag doll.

  I thought I was dead, but then I heard Vera’s voice much closer than I even realized.

  “Last chance. Drop it, or I shoot,” she said.

  “Go ahead and try it!” he shouted as he started to pull the trigger.

  And then she did what she’d just threatened to do.

  Chapter 20

  “YOU SHOT ME! ARE YOU crazy?” Hank screamed as he clutched at his left leg.