Troubled Treats

by Jessica Beck

  “Is that okay with you, Suzanne?” Momma asked. She’d been wanting me to spend more time with her husband, and I had to wonder if she wasn’t using this as an excuse to make it happen.

  “That’s fine, if I can drive us in my Jeep,” I said.

  “It’s a deal,” Phillip said, and then he kissed his wife before he turned to me. “Let’s go, Suzanne. This is exciting.”

  “It’s probably going to turn out to be nothing,” I said, trying to keep his enthusiasm at a healthy level.

  “Maybe, but what if it’s not?” he asked as we walked to my Jeep together and got in.

  The drive to the factory was a short one, and no one was working, so we had the place to ourselves. I got down on my hands and knees and began to study the emblem buried within the pattern of the floor. Though the blood had dried thoroughly and had been washed away with repeated cleanings, I was still careful where I put my hand.

  I didn’t want to touch the spot where Sully Jackson had breathed his last breath.

  “I don’t see anything,” I said as I started studying the inlaid wood and stone. “Do you?”

  “There’s got to be something here,” Phillip said as he joined me. In random patterns, we both began pushing and probing the stone and timber at various spots, hoping to find some kind of trigger mechanism that opened it.

  If there was anything there, we couldn’t find it.

  “Should we just tear up the floor?” Phillip asked me. “It’s the only way we’ll ever know if we were right or not.”

  “Hang on a second,” I said as I spotted a small hole in the center of one of the timbers. “What’s that?”

  “It looks like a wormhole to me,” he said.

  “Do you have a pen on you?” I asked him.

  Phillip retrieved one from his notebook and handed it to me. “It’s too big. It’s never going to fit.”

  “Not like this, but I have an idea,” I said as I unscrewed it. While it was true that the pen itself wouldn’t fit into the opening, the plastic cylinder that held the ink might. I pulled the pen apart and then pushed the plastic tube downward into the hole. It started to bend under the pressure, and I was about to pull it out, when I heard a distinct click.

  Something had happened to the emblem as I’d done it.

  As one piece, the entire thing shifted in the floor, raising itself up enough to reveal edges where I could pull it open.

  As I gently eased the secret lid in the floor open, I held my breath, wondering what we were about to see.

  And then I heard a voice behind us ordering me to stop what I was doing and step away.

  As I pivoted around, I saw a familiar face holding a gun on us, and I knew that they’d been waiting all along for us to uncover the hidden treasure to claim it for themselves.

  Chapter 21

  “Very good,” Carl Descent said as he looked greedily at the hidden cache we’d just uncovered. “What’s inside the hole?”

  “Sorry. It’s empty,” I said as I looked down, though what I’d told him was far from the truth. There were at least fifteen small velvet bags in the bottom of the opening, and each one looked as though it contained at least a dozen coins each. I had to stall Descent to give us time to come up with some way to counter his attack, and lying to him seemed to be the best option that we had at the moment. “How did you even know that anything was here?”

  “I didn’t, at least not with any degree of certainty,” he said. “When your mother turned my final offer down today, I decided that I had to move quickly or risk losing the gold forever. My grandfather used to talk about it all of the time while he was still alive. It had been an obsession with him, and I caught the fever myself. I was about to break in when I saw you two coming, and from your expressions, I knew that you were on to something, so all that I had to do was to sit back and wait.”

  “Is that why you killed Sully?” I asked. “For the gold?” It didn’t seem like any motive worth murdering someone over, at least not as far as I was concerned.

  “He caught me snooping around, and he threatened to have me arrested for trespassing. I couldn’t have that; someone might figure out what I was really doing here. When I tried to offer him a bribe to keep his mouth shut about finding me there, he got so angry that he grabbed me. The man was full of some brand of righteous indignation that I’d never seen before. What choice did I have? I had a right to defend myself, so that’s what I did.”

  He’d found a way to justify the murder in his own mind, and I had to wonder if he actually believed what he was saying now. “And then you ran away.”

  “I did what I had to do,” he repeated, almost like a mantra.

  “It’s still murder,” I said.

  Descent shrugged his shoulders. “Are you sure that it’s in your best interest to convince me of that? If it’s true, then what will a few more bodies matter in the end?” He gestured with his gun before he added, “Stop lying to me, Suzanne. I saw your eyes light up when you looked down. That cache isn’t empty, is it?”

  “Sorry. You’re out of luck. I guess you killed Sully for nothing,” Phillip said beside me. Good. I was thrilled that he was playing along. Maybe we’d make it out of this alive after all.

  “I don’t believe either one of you,” he said as he gestured with his gun. “I’m not sure why I bothered asking; it will be easier for me to check after you’re both dead. Now, I’m going to ask you one last time. What did you find?”

  “There are bags of something down there, but I can’t swear what they are. You should check it out for yourself,” I said. If I could get him close enough, we might just have a chance to overpower him.

  “You don’t need that gun,” Phillip said beside me. “We aren’t going to resist. If it’s indeed gold, take it. We won’t try to stop you.”

  Descent seemed to be thinking about his options, and then finally he nodded in my direction, gesturing with his eyes that I was to follow his lead. I didn’t know what he had in mind, but I suddenly had a plan of my own. However, much of it depended on what Descent did next.

  “Why don’t I believe either one of you? Go on. Reach in slowly and retrieve one of the bags.” As Phillip started to comply with the order, Descent barked out, “Not you! Suzanne, you do it.”

  “I’m doing it,” I said, making my voice quiver a little with fear. I didn’t even have to fake it; I truly was frightened that we weren’t going to get out of this alive. It was time to act, and fast.

  We might not get a second chance.

  I reached down and grabbed two bags, not one, as I’d been instructed. It felt as though there were plenty of coins inside when I lifted them; the bags were heavy, weighing more than they should have if they’d held anything but the precious metal Carl Descent had been dreaming about since he’d been a boy. It appeared that the small bags really did contain gold coins. I did my best to disguise the fact that I now held two bags, not one.

  “Very good. You’re doing fine. Now don’t try anything tricky and toss it to me,” Descent ordered, the avarice clear in his voice and his gaze.

  This was going to be tricky. I had to toss one bag while still holding onto the other, all without the killer noticing. There was only one way I could do that. I had to spill one of the bags. Fortunately, the material had rotted sitting in that enclosure for all of those years, so one of the bags tore easily as I tugged on it.

  “I’m waiting!” Descent said impatiently.

  I didn’t have any way of warning Phillip of what I was about to do, but that couldn’t be helped. I just hoped that he didn’t get shot in the process. Not only did I want him to stay safe, but I had no idea how I’d tell Momma if I somehow managed to get her husband shot.

  As I tossed one of the bags to him, I made sure to spin it in the air in a high arc, and sure enough, gold coins tumbled out of the bag on the way down and scattered across the floor.

  Descent was suddenly mad with lust for the gold now. He seemed to forget all about us for a moment as he dove
for one of the rolling pieces, still shiny and bright after all those years.

  It was the only chance we had. Taking the other bag in my hand, I swung it at his hand when he got close enough, doing my best to knock the gun out of his grasp.

  I failed.

  Carl Descent managed to step back out of my swing’s arc, and the next thing I knew, Phillip was charging him full steam, and head on. The gun in Descent’s hand exploded once, and I saw my stepfather jerk backwards with the impact of the bullet.

  He’d been hit.

  Without thinking, I launched myself at the killer. Descent was stronger than I was, but he wasn’t expecting an all-out attack. I managed to knock the gun out of his hand, but I couldn’t quite get control of it. As we both dove for the weapon, I knew that I had to stop him, or I’d join Phillip in his fate.

  I wasn’t even thinking as I drove my thumbs into his eyes, hoping to blind him with the fury for what he’d done raging through me.

  He suddenly forgot all about the gun and started fighting me off, breaking my grip before I could do any substantial damage to his vision.

  As his hands found the gun again, I knew that I was probably going to die.

  And then, just as he started to lift the weapon to eliminate me as well, Phillip roared and dove onto him! He wasn’t dead! As Descent went down in a heap, I joined Phillip on top of him, and the two of us finally managed to contain him when the former police chief finally managed to gain control of the handgun.

  “Are you okay?” I asked him breathlessly as we both stood.

  “Besides being shot, you mean? I’m just peachy,” he said as he grimaced a little. “Luckily he caught me in the fleshy part of my upper arm. I’ll be healed up in no time, but it’s still no picnic. Take your phone out and call the police chief.”

  “There’s no need to do that. I’m already here,” Chief Grant said as he stepped out of the shadows. “Griffin saw you two going in, and then he watched Descent follow you. He called me, and here I am. Sorry I didn’t get here any sooner, but it looks as though you two managed just fine without us.”

  “I didn’t think you were watching the building anymore,” I said as the police chief called for an ambulance for his former boss. Phillip handed the gun over to the acting chief and applied a handkerchief to his wound until the paramedics could arrive.

  “I wasn’t planning on anyone doing it,” Chief Grant said, “at least not officially.”

  Officer Griffin explained as he joined us, “I had a hunch that something was about to happen here, so I decided to hang around some on my own time.”

  “And you spent your time off here, looking out for us?” I asked. “Don’t get me wrong; I’m more grateful than I can say. Thank you.” As Griffin pulled Descent to his feet and handcuffed him, I turned to my stepfather. “How bad is it, really?”

  “Relax, Suzanne, it’s no big deal. He just nicked my arm,” the chief said as he continued to apply pressure to the wound.

  “It looked much worse than that at the time,” I said.

  The chief grinned at me. “That’s what I wanted him to think, too. That way he wasn’t prepared when I jumped him a few seconds later.”

  “Thanks for doing that, by the way,” I said.

  “Hey, it wouldn’t have worked at all if you hadn’t spilled those coins on purpose and then went after him yourself. It turns out that we make a pretty good team.”

  “You know what? I think you’re right,” I said with a smile as the ambulance arrived. My stepfather was whisked away to the hospital, and Descent was led to the waiting squad car before I even realized what was happening. As everyone started to leave the scene, Jake burst in and wrapped me up in his arms.

  “Suzanne, are you okay?” he asked breathlessly. “I just heard what happened.”

  “I’m fine,” I said. “Phillip got shot, but it doesn’t look that serious.”

  Jake frowned. “I don’t have to remind you that I’ve been shot myself, and I can tell you from personal experience that it’s never not serious.”

  “It was a through-and-through in the fleshy part of his arm,” Chief Grant said. “All in all, if you have to get shot, it’s a pretty good place for it to happen.”

  “I’m still not clear on what went down,” Jake told me. “Start from the beginning, and don’t leave anything out.”

  “I wouldn’t mind hearing the details myself,” Chief Grant said.

  “Fine,” I said, and I retold my story to both of them, a performance that I’d repeat several times over the next few days. After I was finished telling them what had happened the first time, I looked at the coins on the floor and asked, “Shouldn’t someone pick those up?”

  “We need to get some photos first,” the chief said. He whistled as he looked into the cache Phillip and I had found. “There appears to be quite a bit of gold down there. So, the rumors were true after all.”

  “It looks that way,” I said. “I still can’t believe Carl Descent would kill just to get his hands on some shiny gold coins.”

  “Do you have any idea how much it’s probably worth?” the chief asked me. “People have killed for a lot less.”

  “I realize that, but I don’t have to understand the motivation.” I took Jake’s hand. “We’d better get going. Momma is going to need us at the hospital for moral support.”

  “Let’s go,” he said as more police officers started to show up on the scene. “Can I do anything to help you here?” he asked Chief Grant before we left.

  “No, I’ve got it covered.” He paused, and then he added to me, “I’m glad you’re okay, Suzanne.”

  “That makes two of us,” I said with a grin.

  As we drove to the hospital, Jake said, “You realize, don’t you, that I’m never letting you out of my sight again.”

  “That’s not very realistic, is it?” I asked. “Is there a chance you’re overreacting?”

  “Suzanne, I could have lost you today. Is that overreacting?”

  “No,” I said, “I think that’s exactly the right amount of reacting. It’s going to be fine, though.”

  “Just don’t go looking for any more hidden gold without me, okay?”

  I grinned at him. “I can promise you that. What do you think Momma’s going to do with her new fortune?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine,” he said as he drove. “I’m just glad that you’re okay.”

  “So am I,” I said.

  As Jake pulled into the emergency room parking lot, I realized that I had everything in the world I needed, and no amount of gold or any other kind of material wealth would make the slightest bit of difference in my life. After all, I was richer than I had any right to ever expect, with a career I loved, a man to share my life with, and a community of family and friends that meant the world to me.

  And in the end, what more could anyone ever ask for?

  Chapter 22

  “Jake, do you have a second?” Chief Grant asked him a little later as we waited in the hospital emergency room for them to patch Phillip up. Momma was back with him, pulling strings somehow to make sure that she saw every step they were taking to fix him, and we were waiting patiently for them to join us.

  “What’s up?”

  “We need to speak with you,” the acting chief said.

  Jake looked around and grinned. “Is that the royal we you’re using, or do you have some imaginary friends hiding behind you?” He was giddy from the relief that nothing had happened to me, and I enjoyed his silly side, mainly because I knew how fleeting it would be.

  “I’m here,” Mayor George Morris said breathlessly as he joined us. “How are you doing, Suzanne?”

  “I’m as good as gold,” I said with a grin. “How about yourself?”

  “Ask me again in ten minutes. Jake?”

  “I’ll be right back,” he said, and then he kissed me before he walked away with George and Chief Grant.

  I couldn’t help wondering what they were up to, but I knew that I’d f
ind out soon enough. Jake and I didn’t keep any secrets from each other, a rule I’d insisted upon after sharing my life with ex-husband Max the first time around.

  I didn’t have to wait by myself, though.

  Grace showed up less than thirty seconds later. As I stood, she hugged me so tightly that I had trouble struggling for my breath. “Easy, pal. I’m okay.”

  “I had to see for myself when Stephen called me. Are you really all right?”

  “Aside from a few scrapes and a bruise or two, I’m just dandy. You didn’t have to rush over here on my account.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong,” she said as she finally released me. “Suzanne, I was wrong.”

  “About what?” I asked, not making the connection yet.

  “I should have been there with you this evening, not Phillip.”

  I took her hands in mine and looked into her eyes. “Grace, it was exactly what you wanted to avoid. A killer was holding a gun on me, and it could have just as easily turned out to be tragic. You were right to take yourself out of the line of fire, and I respect your decision.”

  “Well, I don’t,” she said. “If something had happened to you, I never would have been able to forgive myself.”

  “What makes you think the outcome would have been any different?” I asked her. I wasn’t trying to be mean, but she’d reached her earlier decision for a very good reason, and nothing had changed to impact that.

  “If you’re going to get yourself killed, I plan to be right there beside you from now on,” she said. In a more timid voice, she asked, “If you’ll have me, that is. Can I come back to the team?”

  “Are you absolutely certain that’s what you want to do?”

  “I am, one hundred percent. Do you want to know the truth? I missed being in the middle of things. It turns out that my life is kind of predictable when I take you, and our investigations, out of the equation.”