I believed him.
She tried to force her mind to other topics, any topic, as long as it was not Dr. Krupe.
It was several minutes before she mustered the strength to pull herself up and stumble back to her desk. Dr. Lester Krupe followed her.
Chapter 24
OUT of habit, Bill Glothe looked at the people in the cars passing by. Generally, he couldn't tell anything about them. But sometimes he caught a snapshot of the person: the young girl checking her hair in the mirror, probably going to see her boyfriend; the businessman, arms straight and stiff as a corpse, worrying over some problem at work—or at home; the elderly gentleman straining to see the road; the young man, so sleepy his head kept bobbing; the mother, trying to scold her young child while she drove; the teenager, keeping time to the music with her head, or texting while she drove.
Sometimes, he recognized the driver. This was one of those times.
That's Kenderson, all right. And if I want to talk to him, I'd better catch him now.
When the traffic cleared, Bill whipped the police car in a sharp U-turn and sped up to catch the rust-colored truck. He flashed his headlights a couple of times, but Kenderson either didn't see or didn't care. After half a mile, Bill turned on his flashing lights. It took another quarter of a mile before Kenderson finally acknowledged the lights, pulled off to the shoulder and stopped.
Bill pulled to a stop behind the truck, got out and walked up to the driver’s window.
"What's going on?” Kenderson demanded.
"Just need to talk to you for a few minutes. We can do it back in my car, or we can go to my office. Your choice.” Glothe worked at sounding non-confrontational. He knew he couldn't force the issue.
"What about?"
"Come on back, Randal. Won't take long.” He smiled and tilted his head toward his car.
Kenderson glared at the sheriff. "Better not. I got to meet a man on some business."
"If you'd rather stop by my office later on today, we can do it then."
"Hell, no. Ain't got time for that. Let's get it over with. But this better not take long."
As Bill walked back to his police cruiser, he made mental note that Kenderson’s truck was freshly washed. No mud on the license plate, which was indeed bent. But whether or not it would obscure a number would depend on the angle of the camera. No help there, he thought.
#
Bill pulled out a pad and pencil. "You called Crystal Moore last night?"
"Something wrong with that?"
"Well, no. Nothin' wrong. But Eula had told you she wouldn't sell you her timber."
"She's dead; ain't got no say in it now. Stupid old woman. Never could understand trees grow back. Hell, we could have timbered that area three times since she's owned it. Expect her granddaughter'll have more sense."
Bill made a few notes on the yellow pad to mask his anger. He couldn't imagine anyone speaking so ill of the recently deceased. "Randal, that's no way to talk about Eula. ‘Pert near everybody around here liked her.”
"Not everybody. World's better off without her."
Glothe struggled to keep his temper in check. His tone turned coldly serious. "Where were you last Monday afternoon?"
"I was—.” Randal Kenderson stopped, half turned and leaned back against the door, his manner changing from aggressive to cautious. He squinted his eyes. "Why do you want to know?"
The patrol car swayed slightly as an eighteen-wheeler roared past.
"Coroner's report said fire wasn't the cause of death. A sharp blow to the head was."
"So?"
"So, a truck like yours was seen over near Eula's place. Where were you last Monday?"
Kenderson aimed a scorching look at the sheriff. A muscle in his jaw twitched. Barely opening his mouth, he said through clenched teeth, "This truck was in Hahnstout's shop all day.” He reached over, opened the door and got out.
"But where were you?"
"We're finished. Don't bother me again 'lessun you got a warrant or something.” He stormed off, leaving the door open.
Bill sighed and leaned over trying to reach the door, but it was open too far. He got out and started around the front of his car just as Kenderson pulled out, spinning his wheels and throwing gravel and dirt back on the sheriff.
I didn't handle that too good, Bill admonished himself. Made him madder'n a wet hen. Even if his truck was in the shop the day of the fire, he still could have been at The Park in a different car. And his truck could have been the one at The Park yesterday. Bill slammed the door closed. Didn't find out a damn thing. Except he's mad enough to kill somebody.
Chapter 25
“HE’S going to be here next week.” This time, Crystal did not wait for the probing questions—or the nightmares. She told her housemate about Dr. Krupe’s impending visit as they sat in the living room.
For the past hour, ever since Mark had told her who the consultant was, panic had been building. It grasped her heart so strongly she had felt unsafe driving. She shivered, the cold despair overcoming the warm autumn evening.
“So?”
“So, I’m going to have to face him. I can’t hide.”
“He’s not your advisor anymore.” Brandi sipped a Lone Star longneck.
“No. But he’s a consultant to the venture capitalists who fund IRS. Don’t you see? He still gets to approve or disapprove of my work.” Crystal reached for her drink and knocked it over. She just sat there and watched the amber liquid spread over the coffee table.
Without a word, Brandi retrieved a towel from the kitchen and cleaned up the mess. Crystal murmured thanks but didn’t look up.
Brandi flopped down, took another pull on the Lone Star and studied her friend. “Actually, this is a good thing.” The statement brought Crystal’s head up. “See, you’re still letting this thing bug you. It’s baggage. And you’re not dealing with it head-on. So, it isn’t getting resolved. His coming will force you to face him and once and for all get rid of these devils.”
Crystal sighed. “All well and good to say.”
“Crystal, I’m not very smart, like you are. I don’t know a bigabyte—”
“Gigabyte.”
“Gigabyte from a love bite, or a freckle on my behind. But I do know this. If you lay down on the floor, people are going to wipe their feet on you. You’ve got to stand up to this Dr. Crap, look him in the eye. Don’t back down. You’re better than he is. Remember that. Better.”
The last was said with such intensity that it came out as a command. Brandi’s hands formed small fists and every muscle in her body was tense. She drew in a deep breath. “He was the creep who tried to get in your pants. And not just any old creep. Your advisor. He’s one unethical SOB.”
“But nobody knows that.”
“Wrong. You know it. And he knows it. Look him in the eye and let him understand you know what an unethical bastard he is. Make him worry you’ll tell his boss. Stanford wouldn’t put up with that kind of crap.”
“I couldn’t do that. He knows I couldn’t.”
“Show him you’re stronger now. Make him uncertain. You can do that. You can worry his ass off.”
Crystal’s head drooped down and she shook it slowly.
Brandi put her hand under Crystal’s head and lifted it up until they were looking at each other. “Look him straight in the eye. Say something about remembering what a nice house he had. Then, just the hint of a smile. Keep looking in his eyes with this secret weapon hidden behind your smile. And say to yourself over and over, ‘I’m going to the president of the school. I’m going to tell just what a sleazebag you are.’ If you keep this little, knowing smile, and keep thinking those thoughts, he’ll get the message.”
Brandi nodded several times. “He’ll hear it loud and clear, like you were shouting in his ears. He’ll start sweating. And he’ll have more respect for you. Not that you care. But the important thing is, he’ll worry. Because he knows he’s a bastard and knows you can tell the world he is. And if you say it out loud,
maybe others will take up the chorus. He’s going to be afraid.”
#
Crystal suffered through another fitful night, tossing and turning, her sleep plagued by nightmares. In one dream, Dr. Krupe was trying to kill Nana. At five o’clock, after lying awake for an hour, she dragged herself out of bed and stood under the shower for thirty minutes. Realizing she wouldn’t get any meaningful work done this morning, she decided to drive to Wooden Nickel and visit her grandmother. Maybe that would reset her emotions and allow her to continue life. Nana could always soothe her. The Park was Crystal’s safe haven. She called IRS and left a message on the answering machine that she would be in after lunch.
#
Eula and Melva stepped off the porch and started across the yard as Crystal pulled her Lucerne into the drive and parked.
"Hi, Mrs. Larson. Hi, Nana. What are you doing out here in the front? Didn't Bill tell you to stay out of sight?"
"I don’t give two hoots and a holler what he said. Do I look like I take orders from an old Billy Goat?"
"Glad you're here,” said Melva. "Maybe you can talk some sense into old rock head."
Crystal's smile evaporated. "What's going on, Nana?"
"We're going over to The Park. I need to get something.” Eula thrust her chin out, making it clear she was ready for a fight.
Melva shook her head. “I’ve argued till I'm blue in the face. I offered to go get whatever it was she thinks she wants. I'm going to leave her to you, Crystal, and good luck.” Melva turned and headed for the house.
The discussion between Crystal and her grandmother lasted only a minute and before she knew it, Crystal was driving toward The Park. "You're supposed to be dead, Nana. The whole point in this was not to let anybody find out you’re alive."
"Gonna find out day after tomorrow anyway. What's the big deal?"
Crystal didn't respond. She admitted she had lost; she usually did to her grandmother. Perhaps the best approach was simply to watch over her until this thing was resolved. Whenever that might be. They had so little to go on: a puce truck that probably belonged to a man who had disappeared. Maybe the surveillance—
"Stop the car!"
Eula's loud command jarred Crystal out of her thoughts. She slammed on the brakes and pulled to the side of the road. Her heart rate shot up. "What is it?"
"Look. There he is.” Eula was almost shouting. “There's that puce truck. And if my eyes aren't lying to me, that's old jackass Kenderson in it. What's he doing out by The Park?"
Crystal looked down the road. A rust-colored GMC truck was parked across the entrance to The Park. The driver was staring into The Park, as if he were searching for something. He held a tablet in his hand, and periodically, it looked like he scribbled notes on it.
"Let's go," Eula thundered.
"Where?"
Eula looked at her granddaughter like she had just asked where Texas was. "On up to The Park, of course. I want to have a few words with the donkey."
Crystal didn't move.
"Go on. I want to get there before he leaves."
With a sigh and a shake of her head, Crystal took her foot off the brake and eased the car back on to the road, feeling more than a little uneasy.
"Pull up right beside his ugly truck. I'll talk to him through the window."
Only twenty feet separated the vehicles when Kenderson’s gaze left The Park and switched to the approaching car. Crystal could tell the instant he focused on Eula. The blank expression was jolted off his face, replaced by one of disbelief. Crystal eased her car to a stop so that Eula's window was directly opposite the driver of the big Sierra truck.
Eula rolled down her window. "I see they still let dumb animals wander around without a leash."
Kenderson's mouth hung open and his eyes were like saucers. His big, beefy face twisted as he tried to justify what he was seeing with what he knew to be fact. "You're dead. They had your funeral. I read about it in the Gazette."
"I'm alive as a sunrise, and a good thing, too. You're out here sizing up my trees again. Well, forget it. You ain't cuttin' a one."
"They buried you.” His conviction was faltering and his voice took on the tone of a person trying to convince himself he was right. "I talked to Buddy. He was there. He took your body to the funeral home.” He blinked his eyes as if trying to clear away an apparition. "You were dead."
Eula had a smug look on her wrinkled face. "Then you know I came back from the dead—for the sole purpose of protecting my trees."
For a long minute, Kenderson just stared at Eula. Slowly, the bewilderment began to fade. He glanced at Crystal, then focused again on the feisty old woman. "If you had a near-death experience, then maybe you got smarter. Maybe you know now that timbering your land won't hurt it."
Eula's eyes narrowed and the look she gave him was a blast of winter from the north pole. "Randal, you don't timber land. You rape it. And I'll not have you raping my land, even if ‘it don't hurt,' as you say. I don't want you on my land. Move on."
"I don't think you own the county road."
"You're on my land, not the county's. Git."
"Well, pardon me. I did get my wheels off the road and on your land. If your driver'd get her car out of the way, I'd move over five feet."
"Don't bother with five feet. Just keep going.” Eula motioned for Crystal to pull forward. Crystal tore her gaze away from the double gun rack in the back of Kenderson's truck and eased past him.
Kenderson spun his tires and jerked out onto the asphalt, then slammed on his brakes and skidded to a stop. He stuck his head out the window and looked back at the two women. "Damn shame you wasn't killed in the fire. Do the area a lot of good. Maybe next time.”
The truck's tires screamed as he jammed his foot on the gas pedal. In thirty seconds, the big 4x4 crested the hill and vanished from sight.
#
Wrung out by the encounter, Crystal could not enjoy the drive through The Park. While it was fun to see Kenderson's confusion and disbelief, his anger frightened her. When he said it was a shame Nana wasn't killed in the fire, his voice resonated with conviction. The final three words reverberated in her head and sent a chill down her spine. Maybe next time. She shook her head, trying to clear her mind. Rehashing that scene would only tie her stomach in knots.
Later, sitting on the veranda, Crystal broached the subject of her grandmother moving into Dallas. "Nana. I worry about you. And today's scene didn't help."
“Oh, Kenderson ain’t got the brains to be dangerous. He’s just an unhappy old man. He’d complain if they hung him with a brand new rope.”
“He still worries me.”
"If you got time to worry, you ain't doing enough."
Crystal opened her mouth to object, but didn't know what to say. Before she recovered, Eula was talking again.
"Maybe that's why you haven't turned Mark's eye yet."
Crystal glared at her grandmother. "Nana! Mark is my boss, not a prospective husband."
"Husband? I didn't mention husband. Did I say husband?” Her expression was one of complete innocence. “But I guess it's been in the back of your mind."
"It certainly has not."
"Why?"
Crystal just stared at Eula. "He's not my type."
Eula cackled.
"Besides, he doesn't consider me that way. I'm just an employee. A good one and he appreciates that. But ... he wouldn't ask me out on a date."
Eula rocked slowly for several minutes and a contented expression descended over her face. "Did you know I worked for your grandfather? When I got out of high school, I started working at his store. I'd been there six months, maybe, when he called me in and said I was fired. Well, I stood up a little straighter and said 'Just why is that?'” Eula pressed her lips together and grinned. "He said, 'So I can ask you out.' I told him he didn't have to fire me to take me out, but he said his father, who really owned the store, had a policy against any dating between people working at the store."
"
What'd you do?"
"I said never mind. I quit. I'd get another job somewhere else. And I didn't have a date for the boot scoot Saturday night. He bowed slightly and said, formal as could be, 'Eula Jaymeson, could I escort you to the town dance this coming Saturday?'” Eula gazed out through the trees and smiled. Her eyes sparkled, even as they misted over. "The rest, as you kids would say, is history."
#
Crystal drove Eula back to Melva's house. As Crystal kissed her grandmother good-bye, the older woman's arms wrapped around her granddaughter and held her tightly. "Thank you for a wonderful morning. I’m so glad you came."
Crystal got in the car and was backing out when Eula yelled to her. "He really does like you——as a woman. Grandmothers can tell."
#
Crystal was signaling to change lanes on the Woodall Rogers Freeway when she saw it——the second vehicle behind her. A big, brownish-red truck. It was as if someone hung a big sign in front of her: the puce truck! Her eyes locked onto the image of the vehicle, looming ever larger in the mirror.
The loud blast of a horn jarred her gaze off the mirror. She gasped as she realized that, at fifty-five miles per hour, she was one inch from a pale yellow Cadillac on her left. The driver was yelling and shaking his fist at her. She straightened up in her lane, then took a quick look in the mirror. The truck was still there.
Her hands were trembling. Pull yourself together, Crystal. It's just a truck. She moved into the right lane as she passed Pearl Street, took the next exit, and stopped for the red light at Field Street. When she looked in the mirror, it was filled with the brownish-red hood of a truck. Her pulse began to race.
Suddenly, she felt the truck hit her bumper. Not hard. Just a tap. An involuntary scream escaped her lips. Without looking in either direction, she jammed the gas pedal to the floor and shot across the intersection. Brakes screamed and horns honked, but she ignored them.
The puce truck followed. She twisted her head to one side and then the other, desperately searching for a policeman, but found none. She could feel terror coursing through her veins. She raced ahead. It was only a few more blocks to the office, but she felt as if she were making no progress. The more gas she gave her car, the slower it seemed to go.
A Ton of Gold (Crystal Moore Suspense Book 1) Page 11