Stipulations and Complications

by Becki Willis

  While he continued to rant about the injustices wrought upon his family by the likes of her own, Derron tapped out frantic signals against her palm. Madison struggled to decipher them.

  The swipe indicated all. All free. All done. All blank. All…

  She gave up, concentrating on the next sign. An arrow sign, pointing down. All down?

  The sharp rap upon her palm was like a pop. The pop of a gun? The pop of a fist? At any rate, a confrontation.

  Derron repeated the message twice more before she understood. The swipe did not mean all, it meant movement. When he made his move, she was to get down. He would have his gun ready.

  “I understand.” She murmured the words intended for Derron. Clearing her throat, she spoke in a voice strong enough for the father-son duo to hear.

  “Now I understand what all the traps and hot fences and motion sensors were about. Hank doesn’t know, does he? That’s why you told him it was more acreage than it was, why you claimed Allen was the one to instigate the boundary dispute. I understand why you played it up, why you so thoughtfully offered to take care of everything for him and Miss Virgie. You couldn’t afford to lose the cover of the trees in the thicket. You couldn’t expose the entrance to the cave.”

  “So surely you’ll understand when we have to kill you.” Paul’s quiet tone belied the deadly intent of his words. “You know too much.”

  Behind her, Madison felt Derron subtly shift his arm. She needed to distract the men while he covertly worked his arm around and reached for his gun.

  She continued quickly, as if Paul had not made his intentions clear. “I still don’t understand why you thought we would make a connection between the tunnel and this cave.”

  Paul shrugged. “If our family business started in one underground space, accessed by a tunnel, logic says it could likely continue in a similar space, different location.”

  “That logic makes no sense,” she declared stubbornly.

  “We weren’t willing to take that chance.”

  The overhead lights swung wildly from the cable as Derron pushed from his chair. At the same time, he toppled Madison’s chair onto its side, sending her down with a crashing thud and an expanse of cable. Momentarily stunned by the noise and the lights and the overall melee that followed, neither Adams noticed that their hostage was free.

  Derron was small but quick. For all his diminutive size, he worked out regularly and was not only well muscled, but strong. Taken by surprise the first time, he had not fared well in their original scuffle, but the tables were turned now. He easily overpowered the elder Adams, twisting Pops’ arm behind his back as he shoved the gun against his temple.

  “What the—”

  Derron jerked the man backwards, several steps away from his son. He glared up at Paul. “Move, and I kill the old man.”

  “You ain’t got it in you, sugar britches,” Paul goaded. He took a step forward, daring the smaller man to back his claim.

  Madison worked frantically to free her hands. She managed to get one loose, allowing her to scramble from the overturned chair and untie her other hand. Her arms screamed in protest, awakening to the same prickling needles that had accompanied them to sleep. Her head throbbed from the original blow Paul had given her, compounded now by the fall to the floor. But there was finally hope, and it surged her forward, giving her the strength to stand.

  She watched with dismay as Derron seemed to falter. His voice took on a slight whimper. “You’re right, I can’t kill him.”

  Both men laughed, mocking his lack of masculinity.

  Both men misjudged her friend. When he spoke again, his voice had a calm, confident edge. “But I can certainly shoot you.” Without a moment’s hesitation, he jerked the gun down toward Paul’s leg and fired.

  The small caliber pistol was not nearly as deafening as the train had been, but between the sharp report of the gun, Paul’s roar of pain, and Pops’ yelp of disbelief, the combined sounds echoed off the cavern walls.

  Madison feared a cave-in. A rockslide.

  A nervous breakdown, at the very least.

  “You shot me!” Paul wailed, writhing on the ground as blood gushed from his wound. “You freaking shot me!”

  “And I’ll do it again,” Derron threatened. “Move over there to the chair.”

  “I can’t move! I’m bleeding all over the place. You cracked my bone.”

  “Move, or I shoot again. Maddy, find something to tie him up with.” Without taking his eyes off Paul or the gun off his father, Derron backed up and allowed the big man to drag himself toward the chair he had recently vacated.

  Madison hurried to the table, shuffling through mounds of trash and assorted supplies. “Will a tie-wrap do?” she asked, holding up the thin white strips of plastic.

  “Perfect. Paul, one hand at a time. Slow. No funny business,” he warned.

  Madison did not trust the man, even with a bleeding wound and a gun pointed at his father’s head. She approached with caution. Derron instructed him to put one hand behind his back and grab the chair stiles. Still wary, Madison slipped the tie-wrap around his wrist.

  Paul lunged toward her, grabbing for her arm. Madison never stopped to second-guess herself. She whipped out the other item she had found on the table and held it close to his eyes, depressing the button. Aerosol brake cleaner spewed into his face.

  Paul dropped her arm and bellowed in agony. He clutched his blistered eyes with both hands, his cries loud and tortured as he alternately begged for mercy and cursed her existence. Madison dropped to her knees and bound his uninjured leg to the chair’s leg, securing the hold with the plastic strip’s lock mechanism. It might not do much, but it would surely slow him down.

  Pops tried to wrench himself free of Derron’s hold. The younger man used the butt of his pistol to whack the struggling man across the back of the head. He crumpled like a sagging heap of trash.

  “Help me tie him to the other chair,” Derron said. “Don’t bother sitting it upright. Let him wallow around on the floor.”

  They made quick work of securing the unconscious man’s arms and legs, fastening him at odd angles to the chair. There would be no easy escape for him, and certainly no getting through the narrow neck of the cave’s entrance with a chair strapped to him so.

  Paul, on the other hand, still presented a challenge. Blood mingled with tears, streaming down from his ravaged eyes. More blood saturated the leg of his blue jeans and pooled around his foot. His voice was hoarse and his skin was pale, but he managed to curse them both to hell. His head sagged onto his chest, but Madison feared it could be a trick. He might still have the strength to overpower her if she ventured close enough.

  Derron solved their dilemma. Another quick rap with the butt of his pistol, and Paul followed his father into unconscious slumber. “Quick, tie him up and let’s get out of here. We have to go before they wake up and the other one comes back.”

  Madison had forgotten about the third man. What if he heard the shot and came back? What if he was still here in the cave, in another chamber somewhere nearby? Her hands trembled as she secured Paul’s thick wrists with the tie-wraps. Her efforts were clumsy and lacked finesse, but they should detain the man long enough for them to make an escape.

  “Done!” she announced in a shaky voice. She refused to look back at the injured man, refused to feel an ounce of remorse for leaving him in such a condition. Once above ground, she would call for an ambulance.

  Right after she called Brash.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  The third man was long gone. Brash arrived within minutes of Maddy’s call, but there were no signs of anyone other than the two men inside the cave.

  Gerald revived and tried to escape, only to lodge himself and his bulky attachment in the back entrance of the cavern. Paul was still unconscious, more from the loss of blood than from the blow to the head. Both men would live to see prosecution, but Paul’s eyes would never be the same.

  Within days of the or
deal at the cave, life was back to normal in The Sisters. The new normal, the one with which Madison still struggled to adjust.

  News crews camped out on their lawn again, begging for a story. Cameras clicked everywhere she went. Reporters dogged her every step. Fame came calling with a vengeance, proclaiming both her and Derron heroes.

  Law enforcement agencies swarmed the area, sweeping through every known cave and tunnel in the county. Two more labs were found and confiscated. Brash and his officers worked overtime to track down every lead and every known associate. Some gave the chief of police/special investigator for River County credit for the busts, impressed with the speed in which he responded and the scope of his investigation. Others blamed him for not catching the criminals sooner. The third man from the cave was never found, and Gerald and Paul refused to give up his name. Brash pushed tirelessly on, knowing there were countless other criminals who managed to slip past the long arm of the law.

  Life in the public eye rocked on, tossing back and forth with the tide of public opinion.

  Hank and Virgie Adams were devastated by the actions of their son and grandson. They came in person to apologize, explaining they had no idea of the men’s duplicity.

  “I don’t know where we went wrong, Bertha. We tried to be good parents to the boy, but he turned out rotten. He got it in his fool head that you and Miss Juliet had done us wrong, and he was hell-bent on seeking his own justice.”

  “Seems I recall someone else being a might bitter about it, too,” Granny Bert gently admonished him.

  “I’ll own up to my mistake. I admit I took it hard at first. My momma, God bless her soul, always said I would inherit the house. I told my kids the same. But the truth is, it was Miss Juliet’s house to do with as she pleased, and you were a good friend to her, Bertha. Maybe she found out my grand pappy was brewing liquor down there. Maybe she just changed her mind. Don’t matter. It was hers, and she left it to you. It took me a while, but I came to realize that, and I didn’t hold it against you and Joe. I reckon I forgot to tell my son and grandson as much. And for that, I am purely sorry.”

  “Don’t go beating yourself up over it, Hank. You had no idea Gerald was brewing up something worse than corn liquor down in that cellar.”

  “I swear to you, Bertha, Madison, I had no idea. I never even knew about the tunnel until my momma was dying. She talked about it while she was out of her head, so I never knew if it was true or something she dreamed up. But I reckon Gerald checked it out. And you know the rest of that sad story.”

  Madison’s heart went out to the grieving couple. Gerald’s parents were not responsible for what he and Paul had done. It was bad enough that the elderly couple might never see their son and grandson again, except through prison bars. Two wasted lives, destroyed by bitterness, drugs, and greed.

  She gently changed the subject. “So what about Clarence?”

  “I tend to agree with you. He and my grand pappy were most likely in cahoots on building the tunnel, each for his own purpose: one to run moonshine, one to moon over Miss Juliet. From all accounts, my momma’s half-brother wasn’t firing on all four cylinders. He was a brilliant carpenter, but a bit shy on common sense and social skills.”

  “Hank did that DNA thing, to see if it was his remains you found in the cellar,” Virgie added. “Only time will tell on that, but we all agree it’s the most likely explanation to his disappearance.”

  Before they left, Hank turned back to his old friend, his weak eyes bright with emotion. “Bertha, you’ve been a fine friend through the years. I need to know the fool actions of my son and grandson haven’t ruined all that.”

  “Oh, go on, you old fool,” Granny Bert snorted, trying to hide her own emotions. “Takes more than a couple of young upstarts to ruin an eighty-year-old friendship.”

  He nodded, but his eyes were still moist. “Maddy, let me say again how sorrowful I am about what those two did to you.”

  “I don’t hold you responsible in any way,” Madison assured the grieving parents. “And please, when the house is done, I want you to come for supper one night.”

  “We’ll see,” the old man promised.

  “If we can see fit to step inside those walls, knowing what our family did there, we’ll come,” his wife promised. “And we thank you for the gracious offer.”

  Annette Reynolds, however, was not nearly as gracious. After threatening to sue everyone involved and even many who were not, she demanded that ‘the children’ return to Dallas immediately. A heated confrontation ensued, Maddy’s side of it running along the lines of ‘when hell freezes over and they bury my cold, dead body in the ice.’ Madison slammed down the receiver before her mother-in-law could reply.

  She was still quaking with anger when Blake plunked down beside his mother on the sofa. His blue eyes were troubled. “She can’t do it, can she, Mom? She can’t make us go back and live with her, can she?”

  Madison put her arm around the teenager and hugged him close. “Of course not, sweetheart. She’s just making noise.”

  “I don’t want to go back. I like it here.”

  “Good, because this is where you’re staying.” Trying to make light of the situation — and angrier still at Annette for upsetting the boy with such nonsense — she tapped him on the nose and smiled. “I love you bunches. You know that, right?”

  “Sure, Mom. And we love you bunches, too.”

  “And no one is going to come between us.” Madison added the last as Bethani curled onto the couch on her other side. “It will always be the three of us, a united front against the world!” She encompassed both teenagers with her outstretched arms. She glanced at the clock. “Nick and Amanda are due here any minute. They want to re-install the cameras here at the house, but I’m standing strong. We are not going through that again.”

  “I thought you had a contract,” Blake reminded her.

  Madison tried to hide the worry in her eyes. “I do. But I may have to break it, because I’m not putting you two at risk again. They can do what they want at the Big House, but I draw the line here. No more cameras.”

  ***

  With the house quiet for the night and everyone else in bed, Madison curled up on the front porch swing and called Brash.

  “How did your meeting go?” he asked, his warm baritone wrapping around her like a favorite quilt.

  “Better than I anticipated. Amanda balked and tried to threaten me, but I stood firm. I took a page from Granny’s rulebook and made noise about a lawsuit, playing up the fact that Paul was their employee and that the cameras put our lives in danger.”

  “Good girl.” She could hear his chuckle. “I’m proud of you, sweetheart.”

  Madison wisely omitted how Nick had come to her rescue, arguing the case on her behalf. He did a far better job than she did, convincing Amanda to ignore their original contract. Using equal amounts of persuasive argument and charm, Nick insisted they would have enough footage from the cameras at the mansion and select areas around town.

  The celebrity carpenter had too much invested in the remodel, both emotionally and physically, not to see the project through. He saw the neglected mansion as his own personal challenge and was determined to breathe new life into its faded floorboards and sagging beams. Madison knew Nick was largely responsible for securing the deal with the network and its many sponsors. She even suspected he had fronted some of the money himself, though she could not prove it. In truth, there were times—like that day in the tunnel, and this afternoon while arguing with Amanda—that Madison suspected his reasons might be of a more personal nature. She was not ignorant of the way he looked at her, nor was she altogether immune to the spark of attraction between them.

  As far as she was concerned, however, that spark would never be kindled. Never ignited. Perhaps she should have made that point clear today. But she had learned enough from Granny Bert to know you never interrupted a man while he was speaking, at least not while that speech was in your defense.

 
Yet she mentioned none of that now, least of all to Brash.

  “It wasn’t without stipulations,” she said. “I agreed to spend more time on-site, therefore more time on cameras at the Big House. I pretended to grumble, but to be honest, it was a better deal than I expected.”

  There was a lapse into silence. Brash broke it with an admission that sounded surprisingly like a growl. “I miss you, Maddy.”

  She was deliberately obtuse. “I-I haven’t gone anywhere.”

  “It feels like it. It feels like we’re having a long-distance relationship. We talk on the phone more than we talk in person.”

  She understood his complaint. She felt the same way.

  Still, she hedged. “Things are so complicated right now…”

  “Things?”

  “My crazy life,” she admitted. “The show. The media. My mother-in-law. And–And Bethani.” Her voice took a sad tumble. “There’s more to consider than my own happiness.”

  “That night on the porch,” Brash recalled, his voice husky. “You wouldn’t let me say what I wanted to say.”

  “No,” she whispered. “I couldn’t.”

  There was a pregnant moment of silence. “If I had…” His voice cracked, so raw that he had to start over. “If I had, would you have had anything to say back to me?”

  Madison closed her eyes as a tear slipped from her lashes. He was asking if she loved him.

  “Most definitely,” she whispered.

  She could hear his smile. It filled the silence between them, softening the hard edges and warming the void. “That’s all I need to know.” His voice was rich and deep.

  She sniffed away a tear as he cleared his throat and went on to say, “We both have a busy summer ahead. You with the house and the job, plus any new assignments with Archer; me with football camp, a couple of law conventions, training a new officer, not to mention trying to track down the rest of the meth labs. Maybe this way is best. It gives Bethani more time to adjust to the idea of us.”

  “I want there to be an us, Brash,” Maddy insisted softly.